


A Scandal in Time and Space

by MedieavalBeabe



Series: WhoLock [2]
Category: Doctor Who, Sherlock BBC, wholock - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Set between Hounds of Baskerville and The Reichenbach Fall, Wholock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2015-10-28
Packaged: 2018-03-01 05:05:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 19,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2760713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MedieavalBeabe/pseuds/MedieavalBeabe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hanging Out Again - Naturally!

“You know,” Hannah said, glancing down at Westminster stretched out below her, “when I said to the Doctor “Let’s go and hang out with Sherlock and the others,” this wasn’t quite what I had in mind.”

 

Lestrade grunted. “I think this gives the phrase “Hanging Out” a whole new meaning, Hannah.”

 

Hannah glanced over at Molly who was doing her utmost not to look down. “You alright, Molls?” she asked.

 

Molly shook her head, pressing her lips together. “I’m terrified of heights.”

 

Sherlock glanced at her. “Just keep your eyes shut and hang on,” he advised in what he hoped was a reassuring tone of voice. Molly immediately did as he said and Sherlock nodded, trying to find something in his Mind Palace that could help the problem.

 

“Oh, God,” John muttered through gritted teeth. “How the hell are we going to get out of this one, Sherlock?”

 

Sherlock said nothing and John took it as a sign that he was thinking hard.

 

“Just to clarify,” Hannah said, swinging her legs upwards to cling on like a sloth. “No one needs to go to the loo right now, do they?”

 

Lestrade managed a hollow laugh. “Not anymore, Hannah.”

 

“Shut up, everyone,” Sherlock commanded. “I need to think.”

 

Hannah shot a frightened glance upwards. She wasn’t sure which terrified her the most; the fact that she, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade were now dangling from the hands of Big Ben, heaven knew how many miles from the ground, or the fact that the Doctor was inside with a lot of staggering, almost defeated Cybermen.

 

“Hey!” she tried to joke awkwardly. “You guys realise that if our weight causes this hand to move downwards, we will have literally gone back in time? Without the aid of the Tardis!”

 

Lestrade chuckled. “Funny!”

 

“Well, we’re not going to fall,” Sherlock muttered, determinedly. “There is a way out of this; just let me find it!”

 

And with that, the others promptly shut up to allow him room to think as they all cast their minds back over how they had come to be in this position in the first place.

 

XXX

 

To tell the story properly required Hannah going back in her mind to the events that happened just before the Tardis made her most recent landing. She had been in the wardrobe of the Tardis, experimenting, as she sometimes did, with the Doctor’s unique styles of clothing and creating unique styles of her own. She had so far come across several outfits once worn by previous travelling companions – ex-members of the Tardis Crew, as she liked to think of them – such as a white dress that had once been worn by a girl named Victoria Waterfield and which had later been worn by a journalist named Sarah Jane Smith for a trip that had involved the Doctor battling robotic mummies. Hannah had met Sarah Jane once before, briefly, and decided that she liked the woman very much. In a way, she reminded her of an older and wiser version of Rose. Then, there was an Air Hostess outfit which the Doctor had told her had once belonged to a friend of his named Tegan, an Australian girl who had accompanied him on many travels; a kilt of McCrimmon Clan tartan which had belonged to a Scotsman named Jamie; a long blue coat and beret set which had belonged to a botanist named Peri and finally, more recently, a maid’s outfit which Martha had worn back in the early nineteen hundreds as part of a disguise.

 

“You don’t half get around, Doctor,” Hannah remarked, hanging the thing back up in the wardrobe. “Do you remember that time I washed my shirt with one of your suits and it came out with the imprint of the suit on it?”

 

“I think that was a far better look for you anyway, Hannah,” the Doctor replied, experimenting with a trilby, doing the trick where he rolled it up his arm and set it on his head. Hannah clapped as he made a “Ta-dah” motion and then went back to searching through the wardrobe.

 

“Ooh!” she exclaimed, pulling out a long, a very long, stripy knitted scarf, all different colours, and with a small patch at one end. “I like this!”

 

“I’d forgotten about that!” the Doctor exclaimed, taking it from her. “I used to wear this all the time! But it wouldn’t match my bow tie now!”

 

He quickly wrapped it around Hannah. She laughed and examined herself in the mirror. “Actually, it doesn’t look bad with this outfit, Doctor. Can I borrow it; just for today?”

 

“On one condition,” the Doctor replied, giving her a hopeful look, like a small boy asking for a biscuit.

 

And, like a mother, Hannah gave in. “Ok, fine, you can wear the fez! But just for today!”

 

“Yay!” the Doctor crowed, replacing the trilby with the red hat he claimed was “cool.” “How do I look?”

 

“Like Tommy Cooper, Doctor,” Hannah replied, and that was when the Tardis landed with her usual grinding of gears, and the Doctor hurried out to see where they were. Hannah ran after him, wrapping the scarf around her neck about six times to make extra sure that she didn’t trip over it.

 

“Where are we?” she asked.

 

“London,” the Doctor replied.

 

“Oh!” Hannah sighed. “Home! That’s so boring!”

 

“Boring?” The Doctor raised an eyebrow at her. “Don’t you remember what happened the last time we came to London, Hannah? I daresay we’ll run into our old friends again.”

 

“How long ago was that in their timeline?” Hannah asked.

 

“Not long, really,” the Doctor replied, absently checking the ormolu clock set into the console, which kept track of current Earth time, without really taking in what it was telling him, before checking the scanner again. “And we’re quite close, actually; Marylebone Road.”

 

Hannah smiled, reassured. “Well, at least it’s not Covent Garden. I mean, that would be really boring,” she added when the Doctor glanced at her. “I mean, that’s home for me. It’d be like going back to Gallifrey for you.”

 

The Doctor looked pained and Hannah instantly realised her mistake. “Oh, Doctor, sorry, I didn’t mean-”

 

“No, I know what you meant, Hannah,” the Doctor replied, reassuringly, his initial hurt fading as he reached out to pat her arm. “If Gallifrey was still there, I wouldn’t want to keep going back to it. Not when there’s the rest of the universe still to explore.”

 

Cheered, Hannah smiled back at him, and the Doctor went on “Anyway, if the Tardis has brought us here without us controlling her, she must have some reason for it, so that can only mean one thing.”

 

“Aliens!” Hannah grinned, snatching up her rucksack and following him to the door.

 

The Tardis had landed on the corner of Marylebone Street, in the exact place a telephone box had once been but which had since been taken away for repairs. Hannah supposed that the Tardis still did try to blend in with her surroundings, occasionally. At any rate, there was no one around, and she doubted very much that anyone would take much notice of the Tardis anyway, especially in a place like London.

 

“Hey, Doctor,” she grinned, patting the Tardis door as the Doctor locked it. “People will probably think she’s just part of this.”

 

She gestured at Madame Tussaud’s a foot away from them. The Doctor chuckled. “You don’t fancy going in there, do you, Hannah?”

 

“Been there, done that, never again,” Hannah responded. “And I really shouldn’t have done it, with my automotonophobia.”

 

The Doctor smiled, fondly, at her. One of their first travelling adventures together had seen them beat the Autons and Hannah had been terrified out of her mind the entire time. Usually, she claimed she was alright; she could go into shops alright knowing that they had mannequins in them, but sometimes paranoia set in, and having fought the Autons now twice in her life hadn’t really done much to help her phobia at all.

 

Still, as he had once reminded her, “everyone’s scared of something; even the Daleks, Hannah,” and so they both made their way down the road together. The Doctor whipped out his sonic screwdriver and held it aloft, alert for any signs of alien activity. Hannah reached behind her to make sure she could reach the handle of her wok. In a situation without the Doctor, she reflected, she would probably just use her abilities to create an ice blade or even a bow and arrows to fend off their enemies, but as it was, it had to be the wok or nothing. At any rate, she felt safer with some kind of weapon, even if it was one that people often scoffed at. “Never underestimate the power of a wok,” she would reply to any raised eyebrows whenever she whipped the thing out.

 

“Ah!” the Doctor exclaimed, his eyes lighting up in excitement as the sonic suddenly flashed. “Ah-ha-ha!”

 

“What’s up?” Hannah asked.

 

“It’s detecting something!” The Doctor exclaimed, pulling her into a quick one-armed hug in his excitement. “It’s scanning...it’s locking on...and it’s got it!” He abruptly released her and began to spring off down the road like a crazed Olympic torch bearer. “Follow the screwdriver!”

 

“Well, hold on-!” Hannah cut herself off with a sigh and began to pelt after him. The Doctor was a lot faster, however, and Hannah knew that she’d never catch up to him like this. Rounding the corner she finally stopped and leaned her hand against someone’s front door as she caught her breath. “We don’t all have two hearts, you know!” she called to the tiny dot in the distance that was the Doctor. “Oh, I give up!” she added, wondering whether or not she had enough energy to collapse.

 

The choice was made for her, however, as the door she was leaning against opened and she toppled into the flat with a yelp of “Whoa!”

 

“Hannah, you know there’s a perfectly good bell,” said a familiar voice.

 

Hannah looked up in surprise and then grinned at Sherlock. “Really? I had no idea!”

 

“You ok?” John asked, crouching beside her.

 

“Yeah,” Hannah replied, sitting up. “Just need to catch my breath. And possibly join a gym.”

 

“Indeed,” Sherlock agreed, drily.

 

Hannah gave him a look and clambered to her feet, brushing herself down. “No wonder you don’t have a girlfriend.”

 

“Who says I want one?” Sherlock returned. “We’re not **all** John.”

 

Hannah couldn’t help laughing as John folded his arms, indignantly. “Excuse me?”

 

“Or the Doctor,” Hannah added, which provoked a smile from John this time.

 

“Speaking of which, where is he?” Sherlock asked.

 

Hannah gave a mock gasp of shock. “Don’t tell me the great Sherlock Holmes can’t work that one out for himself?”

 

This time it was John’s turn to laugh. Sherlock merely rolled his eyes. “Running around like a fool looking for aliens, am I correct?”

 

“Yep!” Hannah replied.

 

“Hm,” Sherlock mused.

 

“What?” asked John, sobering up.

 

“It’s just possible that he’s going in our direction,” Sherlock replied, signalling a taxi, before turning to Hannah. “Coming?”

 

“If it means catching up with the Doctor, yes please,” Hannah replied.

 

John filled her in as they got into the taxi. “Lestrade called a few minutes ago. Unexplained murder, at least they think it’s a murder, in this disused building; a local man found dead this morning with not a mark on his body.”

 

“Well, what makes him think it was murder?” Hannah asked, leaning forwards in her seat.

 

“Because twenty three year old students don’t just drop down dead without cause,” Sherlock replied, bluntly.

 

“Oh.” Hannah shuddered. “My age. That’s pretty scary.”

 

Still, she thought, it sounded familiar, somehow; death with no obvious symptoms, but she couldn’t think how, exactly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> By the way, the beginning of this was inspired by the following picture: 
> 
> http://medieavalbeabe.deviantart.com/art/30DayOTP-Sherlolly-Day9-Hanging-out-with-friends-360148107
> 
> (As in that, Molly is, of course, the safest one on the hour hand whilst the others are all on the minute hand!)


	2. A Clue...or Six!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!

The Doctor skidded to a halt outside the building that had once been a factory but which had long since been forced to close down and subsequently been overrun with ivy and vandalism, and examined the signal the sonic screwdriver was picking up on.

 

“Keep up, Hannah,” he called absently over his shoulder, going on to muse “It’s very faint but this is definitely where it’s coming from. And this _does_ look exactly the sort of place that would be good for aliens to establish themselves on Earth, doesn’t it, Hannah? Not slap bang in the middle of the action; they do like that sort of thing, aliens, don’t they, Hannah, infiltrating Earth and-?” He broke off. “Hold on, Hannah, why aren’t you congratulating me on being so clever?” He pivoted around and realised that she was nowhere in sight. “Oh, honestly!” he sighed, waving his arms in exaggeration. “Humans! I mean, they’re very nice and everything,” he added to a curious looking pigeon who was pecking for crumbs on the pavement, “but why is it I always have to have one who wanders off? I always say to them “Don’t wonder off!” I feel like I should have it written on my forehead some days, I really do! And don’t say “That would be an improvement!” The pigeon simply cooed and took off with a flapping of feathers. The Doctor scowled at it and straightened his bow tie with a mutter of “Bow ties are _cool!”_ before turning back to the abandoned factory. “Note to self,” he muttered, “keep Hannah on a lead from now on,” before he held up the sonic screwdriver again and made his way into the building.

 

Inside it was, as expected, empty and his footsteps echoes eerily as he walked along, as did the cheerful whistling he picked up (‘La donna è mobile’, one of his favourite tunes) and an unnatural chill was settled in the air all around him. Presently, the Doctor was aware of just how quiet the place was. “Strange,” he muttered to himself, scratching his head, as he glanced around the corridor. “You would have thought I would have seen some kind of alien technology lying around by now, or heard someone else.”

 

Even as he was muttering it, the echoes of the level above reached his ears.

 

“What, no one’s got round to that, yet? Anderson!”

 

“Sorry, Inspector.”

 

The sound of footsteps reached his ears and the Doctor quickly ducked into a recess in the shadows as a second later a thing, wirey man with dark hair and a pointed nose appeared, muttering to himself as he walked past “Do this, Anderson, do that, God, it’s bad enough when he’s around...”

 

The Doctor failed to catch the rest as the man stumped past him, still muttering under his breath, and pulling a role of what looked like police tape out of the bag he carried. “Ah,” the Doctor murmured to himself in excitement. “I’ve stumbled onto a crime scene. Excellent!” Then, as a reflection, he added “It’s not as much fun saying something like that when there’s no one around to say “Why, Doctor?”

 

Lightly he left his hiding place and hurried up the stairs two at a time as the voices grew louder.

 

“I don’t know why we’re bothering to call _him,_ ” came the voice of a brusque young woman, the last word said in contempt, almost a sneer. “It’ll be something he ate or something.”

 

“And how do you explain the fact there’s no signs of poisoning?” came the voice that had spoken before, and this time the Doctor recognised the tones.

 

“Fine; heart failiure then?”

 

“He was twenty three!”

 

“So? Stranger things have happened! How do you know he didn’t just have a weak heart in the first place? Has anyone got hold of his medical records yet?”

 

Before her companion could answer, another voice, this time not one the Doctor recognised, cut in “Shh!”

 

There was a pause and then the woman demanded “What?”

 

“Someone’s coming,” the third voice replied.

 

“Probably Anderson,” came the first.

 

“Doesn’t sound like him,” the third voice insisted, and the Doctor stopped in his tracks and whipped around, ears straining, wondering where this person was. And then he realised.

 

“They’ve stopped,” the third voice murmured.

 

With a grin, the Doctor popped his head around the corner and said, brightly, “Sorry to interrupt, but no one’s seen an alien running around this place, have they?”

 

There were three of them; two men and a woman. The man who had heard him coming and the woman, both of whom were unfamiliar to him simply gawped at him, but the other man, with his grey hair and lightly tanned skin, smiled broadly and held out his hand as the Doctor came up to them. “Doctor!”

 

“Inspector Lestrade!” The Doctor acknowledged, shaking the proffered hand and, with his free arm, patting the Inspector on the shoulder. “Good to see you again! How long has it been?”

 

“Half a year,” Lestrade replied, quite honestly.

 

“Oh. As long as all that?” The Doctor shook his head in disappointment. “Second note to self; come back to visit old friends more often. Much more often. Hello!” he added, brightly, to the woman, who had dark skin and hair and was now frowning at him as if unsure whether or not he was mental. The Doctor grabbed her hand and wrung it before she could object. “How are you? I’m the Doctor, and you are?”

 

The woman pulled herself together only after stealing a glance at Lestrade, who gave a brief nod as if to say it was alright, she could trust this man, and replied steadily “Sergeant Sally Donovan.”

 

“Pleasure to meet you, Sergeant,” the Doctor replied, spinning to the other man. “And-?”

 

“Inspector Dimmock,” the man replied, and the Doctor got the feeling that that was the only name he was going to get out of this man, so he didn’t press him, instead shaking his hand and then saying cheerfully to Lestrade “So, where’s this corpse then?”

 

Pointedly the three humans looked down at their feet and the Doctor realised that he was actually standing over the body. “Oh, yes,” he said, quickly crouching down beside the body to examine it. He quickly ran a scan with the sonic screwdriver, searching – and finding – traces of alien energy.

 

“Any clues?” Lestrade asked, crouching beside him. “We have already called in Sherlock, but if you could shed any light on this, I’d be grateful.”

 

“Hm,” the Doctor hummed, finally flicking the screwdriver off and then turning to his friend. “Well, he appears to have been electrocuted, and there are only two posisble ways that could have happened to him, both equally as likely,” he added with a gulp.

 

“Electrocuted?” Sally repeated.

 

“That’s impossible,” Dimmock insisted. “There’d be burn marks, surely.”

 

“Go on,” Letrade said to the Doctor, not taking a blind bit of notice what Dimmock was saying.

 

“He’s either been Exterminated, or Deleted,” the Doctor replied, straightening up in one movement. “Either way, terrible way to go.”

 

“Well, what does that mean, Doctor?” Lestrade asked, also standing up. “Aliens?”

 

“Got it in one,” the Doctor replied, looking somewhat smug.

 

“Oh, what?” Sally folded her arms and looked rather put out as she glared at Lestrade. “Another freak telling us how to do our jobs?”

 

“Freak?” the Doctor repeated, indignantly.

 

“Anderson, pick your jaw up before you fall over it!”

 

The Doctor spun around with a delighted grin as three more familiar voices carried up the stairs towards them.

 

“I didn’t think this scarf looked _that_ bad,” Hannah said as she jogged alongside Sherlock’s strides, alongside John.

 

John grinned. “I think it was more the person _in_ the scarf, Hannah.”

 

“Oh.” Hannah stopped. “Well, he hasn’t seen me first thing in the morning yet.”

 

“Do yourself a favour and don’t let him,” Sherlock half-quipped as he mounted the stairs. Hannah and John hurried after him and, as they turned the corner, Sherlock wrinkled his nose. “God, when you told us you had a fez, I thought you were joking!”

 

“Fezes are cool!” the Doctor insisted, turning and, to John’s surprise, hugging him. “Hello, John! Just throw in Molly and the old gang’s back together again!”

 

“Just like old times,” John joked.

 

“Where _is_ Molly, anyway?” The Doctor asked, spinning about as Sherlock bent down by the corpse.

 

“Bart’s Morgue,” Sherlock replied without even turning as he pulled out his magnifying glass. “Twenty three years old, history student, no family save for an older brother, worst luck, who’s living in New York, following an argument they had about women; added to which he was allergic to cats and had more girlfriends in his lifetime than John and the Doctor combined.”

 

“I doubt that,” the Doctor muttered, raising an eyebrow.

 

Hannah crouched beside Sherlock. “You can really tell all that just by looking at him?”

 

Sherlock looked pleased with the fact that _someone_ was impresed by his skills and he turned to her with a wry smile. “Other people _see,_ Hannah, I _oberve.”_

 

“Well, your friend said it was electrocution,” Sally snarked.

 

Sherlock looked over at the Doctor, his smile fading, and got to his feet. “So you’ve done my job for me, then?”

 

The Doctor gave a sheepish grin. “Sorry.”

 

To everyone’s surprise, however, Sherlock returned it with a grin of his own. “You haven’t deduced how, though, have you?”

 

“Two possibilities,” the Doctor replied, holding both index fingers up in the air to make his point. “And once we elminate one, whetever’s left must be the truth.”

 

“Extermination?” Hannah asked, suddenly realising what the Doctor was getting at. “The Daleks?”

 

“I’m favouring the second option,” the Doctor replied, raising his eyebrows at her.

 

“You said he could have been Deleted?” Lestrade put in when Hannah failed to grasp what he was getting at straight away.

 

“Cybers?” Hannah realised.

 

“More likely,” the Doctor replied, cheerfully. “After all, it’s a factory.”

 

“Right.” Hannah closed her eyes. “Conversion. Very observant.”

 

Sherlock was already delving into his Mind Palace for information on the Cybermen, and becoming rather frustrated that he wasn’t finding much. “An abandoned factory is perfect for any alien invasion.”

 

“That’s what I said,” the Doctor replied.

 

“Oh!” Sally rolled her eyes. “Another one! Great!”

 

“Oh, don’t worry,” the Doctor replied, cheerfully. “It’s only Cybermen!”

 

“Only?” John repeated.

 

“Not quite what I meant,” Sally muttered through clenched teeth.

 

Anderson had finally come up to the group. “What’s going on?”

 

“Shut up, Anderson; I’m concentrating,” Sherlock snapped, irritated.

 

Hannah straightened up suddenly. “Doctor, I’ve just had a thought.”

 

“Go on,” the Doctor said, brightly. “Please share.”

 

“Well, Daleks or Cybermen, they must know we’re here by now,” she pointed out.

 

“That’s a point,” the Doctor agreed, spinning around in a circle just for the fun of it. “Both of them have built-in detectors; but they should have attacked by now.”

 

Even as he said it, everyone heard the dull thunk of heavy metal boots pounding around the corner. Sherlock’s eyes flew open as everyone turned to stare at the familiar metal figure, dressed in silver, as it stopped short a little way in front of them.

 

“Oh, well, better late than never, I suppose,” Lestrade muttered, grimly, throwing up his hands as the Cyberman raised an arm, ready to delete them from existance.

 

The Doctor threw up his hands too. “We surrender! Take us to your leader!”

 

John glanced at him. _“Really?”_

 

“You are incompatable!” the Cyberman replied in its mechanical tone. “You must be Deleted!”

 

“If we’re incompatable, then surely we’re not even worth Deleting?” Hannah tried. “I mean, that’s just a waste of good firepower, right? Obviously not,” she added with an inward groan as the Cyberman levelled its arm at the Doctor.

 

“Delete, Delete, Delete-!”

 

Hannah could feel her power tingling in the palm of her hand, although she had told herself that from now on she would only use it in an absolute emergency.Still, if this didn’t qualify, then what did? Before she could give herself away, however, the Doctor whipped his arm forwards and as the Cyberman fired three shots at him, a sudden burst of energy absorbed the blasts and sent them back towards the Cybermen, hitting it with a low noise that sounded like an almost human cry to those listening. Their attacker fell first to its knees and then collapsed, its head hitting the floor with a thud.

 

“What the hell-?” Dimmock exclaimed, turning to the Doctor.

 

“Drahvanian Energy Aborber,” the Doctor explained, tossing it to Sherlock to examine.

 

“Stolen,” Sherlock replied, turning the thing over in his hands.

 

The Doctor looked rather indignant at that. “Borrowed,” he corrected.

 

“Doctor,” said Hannah in a firm, motherly tone.

 

“I was going to give it back,” the Doctor insisted, stepping over to the Cyberman on the floor.

 

“How’d you know it was stolen?” John asked Sherlock.

 

“Borrowed!” the Doctor called over his shoulder.

 

“Because it’s got the Torchwood Three stamp under it,” Sherlock replied, passing it to him for examination.

 

“Oh, Doctor!” Hannah sighed.

 

“Will someone please tell me what’s going on?” Anderson demanded.

 

“Shut up, Anderson,” Sherlock and Letrade both said, automatically.

 

John stepped over to the Doctor and crouched down beside him. “What..what actually is it, Doctor? A robot?”

 

“Sadly not,” the Doctor replied, turning the Cyberman over and weilding his sonic screwdriver. “They were like us once, well, like you lot, anyway. Human, I mean. But now...”

 

He aimed the screwdriver at the panel in the Cyberman’s chest and opened it. The others, curiousity getting the better of them, well, all but Hannah, that is, since she had seen the inside of a Cyberman before, came over for a look and John blinked as the Doctor pulled a thread of some kind of white gunky tissue from amongst the wires. “Is that..?”

 

“Flesh,” Sherlock finished.

 

“Yes,” the Doctor agreed. “All that’s left of the person this Cyber was before the conversion.”

 

Sally covered her mouth with one hand. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

 

The Doctor rolled his eyes. “See, this is why I like Molly; she can cope with this sort of thing!” He quickly sprang to his feet before Sally could argue. “Come on! A lone Cyberman tryign to convert the world on its own isn’t something I’ll buy!”

 

“Usually travel in packs, do they?” Lestrade quipped.

 

The Doctor grinned at him. “Where there’s a Cyberman, there should be a Cyber Leader! Come on, Hannah, and anyone else who’s coming!”

 

He turned and sprinted off along the corridor. “More running?” Hannah groaned, before hurrying after him.

 

John glanced at Sherlock. “Coming?”

 

Sherlock grinned. “Like they’re can manage without us.”

 

They both sprinted off, and, after a brief hesitation, Lestrade turned to his fellow policemen. “Get the body to Bart’s, notify the next of kin and pack this lot up. I’ll see you at the Met.”

 

And then he sprinted off after his friends.


	3. A Brief History of Cybermen Origins

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!

There was, John reflected, an awful lot of running involved with an adventure with the Doctor, Hannah was right, certainly a lot more than was involved during his adventures with Sherlock. Still, he supposed, it was necessary, after all if there was an alien menace to be laid to rest, then the quicker the better, as it was with criminals. The look in Sherlock’s eyes has he ran was one John knew to be of excitement and anticipation, as it was usually the look he wore when involved in a complex and interesting puzzle, and he supposed the notion of working with their old friend to bring down a hostile alien takeover was just as much of a high for him as solving a mystery.

 

It was odd, he thought, looking back to the day when they had first met the Doctor, that day the Tardis had just materialised in 221B Baker Street on a day when the two friends were bored due to a lack of murders or thefts in the area, to think now that Sherlock hadn’t taken to the Doctor at first. Hadn’t trusted him, he corrected himself, due to his disbelief that this Doctor was also the same man he had met years before as a child, with a different face, and yet now he spoke of him with the greatest admiration, even a slight hint of fondness, in spite of his insistence that sentiment was a weakness and not a strength. John couldn’t blame him for it, though, because in spite of the Doctor’s eccentric qualities and idiosyncrasies – like the fact that he was now wearing a fez, for example – he was a very easy person to like.

 

The Doctor skidded to a halt suddenly and Hannah ran into the back of him. John and Sherlock brought themselves up short in time to keep from running into the back of her, and behind them Lestrade stumbled to a halt, puffing and panting and groaning something along the lines of “Ah! I’m going to have to take up running again!”

 

“Indeed,” Sherlock muttered, drily. “You’ve put on three pounds since our last case.”

 

Lestrade scowled at Sherlock’s back but made no comment.

 

“What is it, Doctor?” Hannah asked.

 

“This factory?” the Doctor asked, pivoting around to the other three. “What did it produce before it was abandoned?”

 

Sherlock opened his mouth to respond but Hannah cut across him. “Meat.” Then, glancing at Sherlock, who was staring at her as if she’d just grown three heads, added “Right?”

 

“How did you know that?” Sherlock asked, making no attempt to hide his surprise.

 

“The rust.” Hannah pointed over to the legs of a metal table. “That’s from blood, right? Iron rusts and turns red and there’s iron in blood, and there’s no need to stare at me as if you’re the only person who knows that, Sherlock,” she added, with a sigh. “I did do Science in school, even if I didn’t pay attention in all of it.”

 

Sherlock looked impressed as he nodded. “It was originally a meat packing industry, before the owner was found to have been using contaminated meat and several people who had consumed his products were either seriously ill or died as a result on ingestion. After that it was abandoned because he was too ashamed to put it on the market.”

 

“In that case,” the Doctor said, with a nod, “it would be the perfect place to turn into a Cyber conversion factory.”

 

“Conversion?” John repeated as the Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver and continued along the corridor. “You mean they want to make us like them?”

 

“Keep up, John,” the Doctor said, without malice. “The Cybermen were originally like us, in fact they were humans from the Planet Mondas, Earth’s twin, the Tenth Planet.”

 

“There are Nine in our Solar System,” Sherlock cut in, automatically. “Or so John tells me.”

 

“Because it’s Primary School stuff, Sherlock,” John muttered, “which you’ve somehow Deleted.”

 

“Seriously?” Hannah asked, glancing at Sherlock, and John nodded, to confirm this.

 

“Well, obviously there are only Nine Planets in this Solar System _now,_ Sherlock,” the Doctor went on, “because Mondas was destroyed after it exploded from absorbing too much energy from Earth in 1986,but before it was destroyed, the humans there swapped most of their human parts for robotic parts in order to ensure their survival, and they attempted to convert the humans of this world too, before their planet exploded, taking the first race of Cybermen ever created with it.”

 

“But they’re like boomerangs,” Hannah added, matter-of-factly with a sigh. “No matter how many times you get rid of them, they keep coming back for more.”

 

“That’s what you say about the Daleks,” the Doctor pointed out.

 

“Well, let’s face it, Doctor, they are very similar beings,” Hannah replied.

 

“True,” the Doctor agreed, with a grin, “but don’t you ever go telling either of them that,” and Hannah giggled. “Ah,” the Doctor added as they reached a room that had had its doors blasted off their hinges. “The main abattoir. No one here has a weak stomach, do they? No? Good!”

 

With that, he led the way confidently inside, and the others followed, each glancing around warily in case a Cyberman should suddenly burst out of the shadows and attack them. Not that a Cyberman would do such a thing subtly, of course, but it never hurt to be on your guard after all.

 

“Things are getting strange, I’m starting to worry,” Hannah sang lightly under her breath, “This could be a case for Mulder and Scully...” Then, noticing the others glancing at her, she smiled in embarrassment. “Sorry, I’ve got that one stuck in my head on repeat.”

 

“Mulder and Scully have nothing on me, Hannah,” the Doctor replied, holding up the sonic screwdriver, and then aiming it at the fused wires in the wall, which instantly came to life and flooded the room with light, and the companions quickly took in their surroundings. The room was filled with what looked like long sheets of plastic hanging down from the ceiling like limp jellyfish stingers, and after making his way through two of these, the Doctor stopped and looked up at the ceiling. “Yes,” he mused, grimly. “The main conversion area.”

 

The others glanced upwards to see an array of terrifying-looking alien equipment, Cyberman surgical equipment in fact, hanging above them and Hannah shuddered, reminded briefly of the film Edward Scissorhands. “New equipment,” Sherlock observed. “It’s not been used yet.”

 

“Oh, well, that’s good at least,” Hannah pointed out. “No one’s been converted yet.”

 

“No,” the Doctor mused, aiming his sonic at the equipment and pressing the button. With a whir, the mechanics slowly came to life, and Hannah ducked to his side at once, the others three close behind her. “Relax,” the Doctor said, “I’m just seeing if this is the same as the last time. And it is.” He pressed the sonic again and the equipment died. Tapping the sonic against the side of his chin, the Doctor turned to the others. “I’ve managed to disable it, for now, which will slow the Cybermen down for now, but remember what I said earlier. A lone Cyberman come to Earth, built this all by themselves? No, I don’t buy that. That one we defeated earlier was most likely a guard, but there must be others working somewhere else.”

 

“Working?” Lestrade repeated. “On what?”

 

“Isn’t it obvious?” Sherlock asked. “Clearly working on some way of getting as many humans as they want to come to this factory to be converted.”

 

“The entire population of this planet, to be precise,” the Doctor agreed.

 

Sherlock nodded his acknowledgement. “That many people wouldn’t just stumble into an abandoned factory by accident and willingly allow themselves to be-”

 

“Upgraded,” the Doctor cut in. “That’s what they’d call it.”

 

“I get it,” said John, slowly. “They can’t just wait around on the off chance that people will walk in here; they need to get them here by force.”

 

“Or some form of harsh persuasion at least,” the Doctor agreed.

 

“Like the earpieces?” Hannah suggested.

 

“That’s a point,” the Doctor exclaimed, straightening up like a ruler.

 

“Earpieces?” Lestrade echoed.

 

“The first time I encountered the Cybermen after the Time War,” the Doctor explained, “was on a world parallel to our own, where the humans received all their information fed directly into their brains, you know, all the important information we get every day,” he added as Lestrade looked confused, “like the News.” Lestrade nodded and the Doctor went on “The Cybermen were able to control the humans through these earpieces, and that was how they got them to the conversion factories then.” With a snap of his fingers, he turned to Sherlock and John. “You haven’t noticed anyone wearing anything like that, have you? Any new form of wireless technology created by a new company or something? Or something that every single person in the world seems to suddenly have acquired from nowhere?”

 

Sherlock shook his head. “No.”

 

“Hm.” The Doctor frowned. “Then what?”

 

“Through other forms of technology?” Hannah suggested. “Mobiles and that?”

 

The Doctor shook his head. “No, I can see your thinking, Hannah, but no. Once again they’d have no guarantee of getting everyone’s attention that way; I mean there are people who still don’t use current technology all that often, aren’t there?”

 

“Well, there’s got to be something everybody uses,” John pointed out.

 

“But would they all use it at the same time?” the Doctor pointed out. “The earpieces were good because people used them every single second of the day to get their information. But humans aren’t glued to mobile phones or laptops all day long, are they?”

 

“Only if they’re Sherlock and they’re bored,” John agreed, causing the Doctor to grin.

 

Sherlock scowled. “Perhaps if the world stopped being boring-”

 

“Alright,” Lestrade interrupted. “So, we’ve got an alien conversion factory in the middle of London, and possibly some other alien beings running around the city that need to be stopped. I mean, they have already killed once. Doctor, what do I do? As a detective inspector, I mean?”

 

“You need to seal off this area and issue a public warning about the Cybermen,” the Doctor replied. “You also need to put your best men on guard outside this factory and make sure that they’re armed.”

 

“Armed with what?” Hannah asked. “Bullets can’t hurt them, remember, Doctor?”

 

“No, but high explosives and electromagnetic pulses can,” the Doctor reminded her. “And you remember the time I souped-up that Sontoran gun to defeat them when we visited Planet Kala?”

 

“Well, do you _have_ a Sontaran gun, Doctor?” Hannah asked.

 

“Ah...” The Doctor looked embarrassed. “No, but that’s beside the point, Hannah. Here, you can borrow this,” he added to Lestrade, tossing him the Drahvanian Energy Absorber, which the Detective Inspector caught deftly with one hand.

 

Hannah exhaled and put her hands on her hips. “What I wouldn’t give for a Dalek right now,” she muttered.

 

Sherlock glance at her in surprise. “Why?”

 

“Because a Dalek can take down an army of Cybermen with just one Extermination,” Hannah explained. “I’ve seen it done. And they used to have this Special Weapons Dalek which could-”

 

“Hannah, you’re brilliant!” the Doctor exclaimed suddenly, and then, much to the alarm of everyone, Hannah especially, he seized her head in both hands. “I could kiss you! In fact I will!” And he kissed the top of her head before sprinting off again with a laugh of “Ha-ha!”

 

“What did I say?” Hannah asked, baffled.

 

Sherlock closed his eyes as he processed what had just happened. “He doesn’t happen to have a Dalek stashed away in that Tardis of his, does he? Or something similar?”

 

Hannah thought for a second and then clapped a hand to her forehead. “Dalek guns!” Then, to John and Lestrade, “We took them from a group of humans they were trying to convert into humanised Daleks in the 27th Century. I forgot we still had them.”

 

“Oi!” The Doctor popped his head back into the room. “Come on; I’m about to be very amazing again and no one’s here to see it! Come on, chop, chop, chop!”

 

Lestrade glanced at Hannah. “Is he always this energetic or has he just had coffee today?”

 

“Nope, he’s always like this,” Hannah replied. “I think it’s something to do with the binary vascular system.”

 

“Binary what?” Lestrade asked as Hannah hurried past him.

 

John frowned and then said, slowly, “Well...if I remember my medical school days correctly, I think Hannah’s implying he has more than one heart.”

 

Sherlock was the only one who didn’t look at all surprised by the revelation.

 

Together the three men followed their friends as the Doctor sprinted all the way back to the Tardis, this time waiting when Hannah shouted to him to wait and let them catch up, and finally leading the way inside. Sherlock, John and Lestrade watched patiently without question as he then proceeded to pull open the D-Section of the Tardis archives and yanked out two devices that looked like a cross between space-age rifles and overly-large egg whisks.

 

“Be very careful,” he instructed Lestrade as he handed one over to him and showed him which trigger to pull to activate the thing. “Don’t let your men Exterminate anything other than the Cybermen.”

 

Lestrade nodded. “If it’s all the same to you, Doctor, I’d like to guard the factory with them, just so they know what they’re up against.”

 

The Doctor nodded, understanding.

 

“What about us?” Hannah asked. “What are we going to do?”

 

The Doctor turned to Sherlock. “Coming with us?”

 

“What in our entire history together makes you think I’m going to say no?” Sherlock asked, raising his eyebrows. They exchanged a grin and then the Doctor swiveled to John. “What about you?”

 

John laughed. “Try and stop me.”

 

“In that case,” the Doctor replied, spinning to Hannah, “in answer to your question, Hannah, we’re on a very special mission.”

 

“Do tell,” she teased, folding her arms and leaning forwards as if about to hear some big secret.

 

“We’re going Cyberman-Hunting!” the Doctor announced, throwing open the Tardis door. “Right after we pick up Molly, that is.”

 

“Why do we need Molly?” Sherlock asked.

 

“Because I like her,” the Doctor replied, cheerfully. “And so do you, otherwise you wouldn’t keep on working with her! Come on, to Bart’s!”


	4. Console for Five, Please

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please excuse the blandness of this chapter, my heart wasn't really in it when I wrote it, but I really wanted to move the story along.

“Right,” Molly muttered to herself, finally peeling off her gloves and rubbing her eyes. She had had rather a late night what with the amount of paperwork she had had to finish off and that didn’t sit well with an early start the following day. At least now after a rather long morning she could have an hour to herself to wind down before she got back to it all. “Lunch.”

 

She was just leaving the room when a force that felt like a whirlwind hit her and lifted her off her feet; that is, if a whirlwind wore a brown jacket, a red bow tie, had arms and could yelp “Molly! Hello! Good to see you again!” in one breath.

 

Molly let out a startled “Oh!” as she was picked up and then realised who had just hugged her. “Hello, Doctor,” she stammered, bewildered as she was set back down again.

 

“Let her breathe, Doctor,” laughed a voice behind him and Molly glanced over his shoulder to see Hannah grinning at her, wrapped in an overly large striped woollen scarf. Not far behind her were Sherlock and John.

 

“Oh, you’re just saying that because you want a hug yourself, Hannah,” the Doctor said, grinning at her. Molly giggled.

 

“Well, yes, but that’s beside the point,” Hannah replied, going up to Molly and indeed hugging her. “Hi, Molls.”

 

“Hi,” Molly smiled, returning it.

 

“Like your jumper by the way,” Hannah added.

 

“Oh, thanks,” Molly replied, surprised. “I mean, it’s only an old one-”

 

“Two years old,” Sherlock reeled off, and Molly blinked at him, and then wondered why she was surprised. This was, after all, Sherlock; he didn’t see, he observed, as he was constantly telling her.

 

“Well, I like it,” Hannah shrugged, folding her arms and looking at Sherlock as though daring him to argue. Sherlock merely smiled at her, however, as if to say that it would take more than a twenty three year old woman with a BA Hons in Performing Arts wearing an over-sized scarf that belonged to her best friend to intimidate him.

 

“So!” the Doctor interrupted before Molly could ask what was going on. He clicked his fingers and pointed at her with a cheeky grin. “The Cybermen are invading and we need to find out what they’re up to, and we’d like you to come with us, Molly!”

 

Molly frowned at him. “What; now?”

 

“Yep!” The Doctor put an arm around her shoulders and led her towards where Sherlock and John were standing. Hannah quickly hurried along beside him. “No time like the present!”

 

“Um...”Molly glanced around at them all and then finally sighed “Looks like I’m changing my lunch plans, then.”

 

To her surprise, however, Sherlock pulled a packet of Quavers out of his pocket and handed them to her. Molly blinked at him and then smiled gratefully. Sherlock simply flashed her that look that he always used to make her drop everything and help him out in a time of need.

 

“Don’t worry, Molly,” the Doctor said, brightly, oblivious to the silent exchanges going on around him. “If it’s work you’re worried about, we can get you back here in time again, no problem, Tardis, remember?”

 

“Right,” John joked, “because that worked so well last time, getting Greg home five hours too late for dinner.”

 

The Doctor looked embarrassed and dropped his arm from Molly’s shoulder. “Ah, well, that was a minor miscalculation on my part, but I can assure you it was a one-off.”

 

“Hm,” Hannah mused, teasingly. “Now where have I heard that before? Could it have possibly been the last time the scanner broke down on us?”

 

The Doctor glanced at her as John and Molly both laughed and even Sherlock looked vaguely amused. Putting his hands on his hips, he fixed her with his most authoritive look. “Tell me, Hannah, since when did you become such an expert on Tardises?”

 

“Oh, come on, it doesn’t take a genius to work out when the Tardis scanner’s on the blink, Doctor; it goes blank and comes up with the message “No Available Data” for a start!” Hannah pointed out.

 

The others glanced at the Doctor, who maintained his impassive expression even as he said, evenly, “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that, Hannah,” before turning on his heels and calling “Come on, keep up, or the world will have ended sooner than anticipated!” over his shoulder at them.

 

His friends hurried to catch him up. “Sorry, what exactly are we doing, Doctor?” Molly asked.

 

“Cyberman-Hunting!” the Doctor replied. “It’s a bit like Dalek-Hunting, only with Cybermen!”

 

“Right,” Molly replied, sounding slightly wary, and she glanced at Hannah for explanation.

 

“Those robot-beings that once invaded every house in the world,” she reeled off and remembering when it had happened to her, Molly nodded.

 

“So, they’re back?” she said, sounding slightly nervous now.

 

“Obviously,” Sherlock cut in.

 

“Yes, but don’t worry, Molly, that’s why I’m here!” The Doctor deftly threw both doors open, one with either hand as they emerged into blazing sunlight. Everyone blinked, automatically, after the darkness of the morgue. “Now, come on, everyone, think!” he added, pivoting around to face them all. “if you were a race of Cybermen trying to upgrade planet Earth, how would you go about it?”

 

“Subtly,” Hannah replied.

 

“Well, _that_ narrows it down a bit,” Sherlock muttered, sarcastically.

 

“Alright, scratch that, start again,” the Doctor said, quickly, as Hannah was about to retort. “Everyone think, think very hard; is there anything new happening in the world, anything new at all? Just something out of the ordinary, maybe it’s been on the news.”

 

John shook his head. “Sorry, Doctor, but no. I mean, if anyone would have heard anything, we would have.”

 

“Hm,” was all Sherlock said, thoughtfully.

 

The Doctor glanced at him. “What?”

 

Sherlock closed his eyes for a second, entering his Mind Palace. “You talked before about them using earpieces to control humans, and for that they’d need a transmitter.”

 

“Go on,” the Doctor said, suddenly excited, like an eager schoolboy on Christmas Eve.

 

“And something that could transmit that much information across the entire country would have to be very tall, at least three hundred feet...” Sherlock’s eyes suddenly snapped open. “Got it!”

 

“What?” the Doctor cried, eagerly. “What?”

 

“It’s like Stephen Hawking meets Brian Cox,” Hannah muttered to the others.

 

“Come on,” Sherlock said, hurrying off along the road.

 

“More running?” Hannah groaned as the Doctor hurried off after him.

 

“It’s good for you, Hannah!” Sherlock shouted over his shoulder.

 

“Cheeky beggar!” Hannah muttered, running after them with John and Molly.

 

To their surprise, Sherlock skidded to a halt outside the nearest newspaper stand, picked up and paper and held it up for them to see. The Doctor took it from him and examined the headlines. “Construction Work Continues On Big Ben.”

 

“Must be a slow news day if that’s their top story,” Hannah commented.

 

“Of course!” the Doctor exclaimed, slapping the front page with the back of his hand. “Just like when the Daleks used the Empire State Building as a transmitter back in the Great Depression!”

 

“What?” John frowned. “I don’t remember that being in the history books.”

 

“You know, John, your species has the most amazing capacity for self-deception, matched by only its ingenuity when trying to destroy itself ,” the Doctor said, turning to Sherlock. “When did they start construction work?”

 

“Three weeks ago,” Sherlock replied, “and at the rate they seem to be working-”

 

“The whole thing’ll be complete by the end of this week-” the Doctor continued.

 

“And if we don’t stop it-” Hannah realised.

 

“Then the entire population of this planet is doomed,” the Doctor replied, tossing down the paper, much to the chagrin of the seller, and spinning in the opposite direction. “Everyone in the Tardis, now!”

 

“No, we’re not landing the Tardis on top of Big Ben, Doctor!” Hannah exclaimed as he aimed the sonic screwdriver at a spot a few feet away from them and with its usual scraping and grinding of gears, the great blue Police Box appeared in front of them once again.

 

“Come on, Hannah, I might be a madman with a box, but I’m not that mad,” the Doctor replied, tucking the sonic back into his pocket.

 

“Care to bet on that?” Sherlock muttered. Molly giggled and Sherlock looked rather pleased with himself for that.

 

“Heard that,” the Doctor replied, pushing open the door.

 

The others followed him inside and as Molly glanced around once more at the familiar interior, she suddenly felt a sense of belonging. It was as if the Tardis, and the Doctor, brought them all together. Well, they had, in a way, she supposed; fighting the Weeping Angels with the Doctor had changed her relationship with Sherlock somewhat. He seemed to notice her more these days, not just observe her, but to notice her in the way that friends notice one another, and she got the feeling that her display of bravery that time she had had the imprint of an Angel in her eye (which the Doctor had, thankfully, disposed of with Hannah’s help) had impressed him more than he let on. Added to that, she liked the Doctor, mad as he was, and trusted him, and both he and Hannah seemed to have taken to her like a dog to a bone.

 

“Question,” said John as the Doctor quickly went to the console and began to fiddle with various dials and switches. “What if we arrive at Big Ben, and there are more Cybermen up there?”

 

“Well, obviously there will be,” Sherlock sighed, rolling his eyes. “How else would they build their transmitter?”

 

“Human slave labour?” the Doctor suggested. “That’s been known to happen before. Or making temporary alliances with power-hungry humans who are prepared to betray their country for their own gains.”

 

“And then promptly get betrayed and killed by the Cybers,” Hannah added.

 

“Right,” the Doctor agreed.

 

“Well, anyway, I mean we’ll be walking right into their midst, won’t we?” John pointed out.

 

“Yep!” the Doctor replied, and then seeing the worry on their faces, added “Don’t worry, we’ll be fine!”

 

“Yeah, we’ve got a lethal wok!” Hannah grinned, holding it up.

 

The Doctor rolled his eyes. “I believe the phrase “I really can pick them” is appropriate here, Hannah,” he muttered, before adding “Take the wheel,”, patting her on the shoulder and hurrying into the back of the Tardis. “In answer to your question, John, we will not be coming up against them short-handed!”

 

There was a sudden crash and Hannah groaned as she flicked the correct switch to fly the Tardis. “Can someone make sure he doesn’t hurt himself, please?”

 

“I’ll do that,” John said, quickly.

 

“Well, I can-” Sherlock began, but John simply shot him a knowing look and left the room. To break the tension, Hannah quickly called after John “And don’t let him take the iron apart again, please, John!”

 

Molly giggled and Hannah smiled as she noticed that Sherlock observing her do so. Something told her that John was trying to help shove the two together, and since she was a romantic at heart, and could see that they were good together even if Sherlock couldn’t just yet, then that was just fine with her.

 


	5. Big Ben, and a Big Bang!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for the late update! Really just had a bad case of writer's block lately! Hopefully it'll get easier from now on!

“So,” Hannah began, but before she could carry on, she was interrupted by a sudden clang and a cry of “Aha!” from the Doctor.

 

“Is that what you were looking for?” John asked.

 

“Well, of course it is, otherwise I wouldn’t have said “Aha,” now would I, John? Keep up,” the Doctor replied, sounding only slightly irritated as he made his way back into the console room and tossed the thing he had dug out of the Tardis cupboard to Hannah. She caught it easily in both hands and turned it over. Sherlock and Molly came up for a look. The device appeared to be some kind of pistol that looked rather like a silver carrot with two external wires spiralling around the barrel, rather like a child’s toy, Hannah reflected, from the nineteen eighties.

 

At any rate, it didn’t look particularly threatening.

 

“Afraid I’ve only got the one,” the Doctor added, sounding regretfully apologetic as he went over to the console. “Who doesn’t usually carry fire? Molly; you can use that. We can always share it out. Sherlock, John, you carry guns, don’t you? Yes, good. Hannah, you’re just going to have to use your wits. You can do that for me, can’t you?”

 

He was talking very fast, as he often did whenever he became enthusiastic about something.

 

“Hang on, Doctor, what even is this?” Hannah asked, holding up the gun.

 

“Oh, didn’t I say? It’s a Glittergun, I thought I’d said that already.”

 

“What use is that?” Sherlock asked, skeptically. “Don’t tell me that these Cybermen are allergic to glitter?”

 

“No, but they are allergic to gold,” the Doctor grinned. “Well, at least they used to be, or rather it used to be lethal to them, but now the most it can do is scramble their circuits, confuse them, you know, so they don’t know what’s what. Useful for sneaking into an army of them and planting explosives.”

 

Hannah grinned as she handed the Glittergun to Molly. “Bit like that jamming device for the Daleks.”

 

“Yes, exactly, Hannah,” the Doctor grinned at her, pulling back a lever on the Tardis console. “Molly, to use that thing, simply-”

 

“Point it at a Cyberman and shoot?” Molly guessed, with a shy smile.

 

“Correct,” the Doctor replied.

 

“So, what, that thing’s filled with flakes of gold or something?” John asked, coming up to him.

 

“Gold dust, actually, from the mines on planet Voga,” the Doctor replied, cheerfully, reaching down into one of the archives beneath the console and pulling out two small black cylindrical devices. He tossed one to John and the other to Sherlock. “EMP grenades, perfectly harmless now, but don’t go pressing any buttons until it’s absolutely necessary, otherwise-”

 

“Otherwise no more Sherlock Holmes and John Watson,” Sherlock finished, drily. “Yes, Doctor, we _are_ familiar with the concept of explosives.”

 

The Doctor just grinned at him and pushed another lever on the console, bringing the Tardis to land with her usual grinding and scraping of gears. He smiled at Hannah, benevolently, like Father Christmas with a child. “You always said you wanted to see the inside of Big Ben, Hannah.”

 

Hannah nodded and picked up her wok. “Yep, Cybermen were just an added bonus.”

 

“Right, let’s go,” Sherlock muttered, tucking the grenade into his pocket and spinning on his heel. He made for the doors but found himself brought up short by the Doctor.

 

“One minute, Sherlock, standard procedure first,” he said, tapping a few buttons on the console. “Let’s see what the scanner’s got to say.”

 

Nothing happened, however, when he pressed the correct button. The Doctor frowned and tried again, but still nothing showed. Sherlock waited a few minutes and then commented “Well, that was impressive.”

 

The Doctor scowled. “Must be on the blink,” he muttered.

 

“No change there then,” Hannah replied, and when the Doctor shot her an indignant look, she added “What? There’s always something going wrong with this old ship.”

 

“Listen, Hannah, this “old ship” as you so kindly put it, is several thousand years older than you are,” the Doctor replied, tapping the side of the console with the sonic screwdriver and then pointing it at her, “so you can’t blame her for having a few faults.”

 

“Can you fix it?” Molly asked, clearly nervous that an argument was about to break out between the two of them.

 

“Yes, just a case of rewiring,” the Doctor replied, casually, tucking the sonic screwdriver back into his jacket pocket. “I’ll do that later. For now, let’s do this the old fashioned way.”

 

With a spring in his step as usual, he all but bounded across to Sherlock, who sidestepped at the last minute to avoid the older man cannoning into him, and pulled open the door, sticking his head out and taking the air like a fox emerging from its hole.

 

“All quiet,” he reported, pulling the door open properly. “Come on, hop to it.”

 

Sherlock rolled his eyes but followed the Doctor. Hannah, John and Molly followed suit, and stepped into the midst of London’s famous clock tower.

 

John whistled at the view. “I can see Baker Street from here.”

 

“I think I can see my flat from here,” Hannah replied, squinting into the distance.

 

“It’s not that one with the smoke pouring from the windows, is it?” the Doctor asked, and when Hannah gave a startled look and began frantically searching with her eyes, he laughed and clapped an arm around her shoulders. “I’m only joking, Hannah!” Stepping back, he pivoted, giddily, and then exclaimed “Ah! Now _that’s_ more like it!”

 

The others turned to see what he was looking at.

 

Sherlock frowned. “That’s only the Great Bell, Doctor.”

 

“I beg to differ, Sherlock,” the Doctor replied, whipping out the sonic screwdriver and pointing it at the bell. “It’s been so cleverly replicated that even _you_ were fooled for a moment. But alien technology is exceedingly clever, so it’s not your fault. Now, I’ll bet you that if I were to hit a certain frequency on this sonic screwdriver right now whilst holding it within this proximity to this “bell,” providing it isn’t actually a bell, it would reverberate the same sound throughout the entire country, as clear as if every single person were standing right next to a radio.”

 

So saying, he pressed the sonic and immediately his companions all clapped their hands over their ears with shouts of pain as a horrible, high-pitched whining filled the room.

 

“Alright, Doctor, we get it!” John shouted over the noise.

 

“What?” The Doctor howled back before flicking off the sonic screwdriver.

 

Hannah, Sherlock, John and Molly shook their heads to clear the lingering after effects of the noise.

 

“Doctor, never do that again,” Hannah said.

 

The Doctor wasn’t listening, he was busy studying the fake bell.

 

“Everyone in the country heard _that?”_ John asked, rubbing his ears, which had popped with the pressure of the sound. “I’m surprised the windows didn’t break.”

 

“Windows?” Hannah repeated. “I’m surprise _our ears_ didn’t break.”

 

Sherlock went up to the Doctor and together they examined the underside of the bell. “This is their transmitter,” Sherlock stated.

 

“Yes,” the Doctor agreed, fiddling with the sonic, “although it’s not quite finished yet. By the time it is, any sound that’s filtered through won’t sound as crude and deafening as that just did. You have to admit it is very impressive what they’ve done here.”

 

Sherlock nodded. “Disguise something dangerous as something ordinary, it’s always a useful trick.”

 

“Yes, the best place to hide anything is always in plain sight,” the Doctor replied, and then with a mutter of “Ah!” he pressed the sonic a second time, but this time, instead of magnifying the noise, the “bell” shed its disguise and turned into something which looked like a nest of wires in a circle fitted with a speaker system. “Oh, look at that,” the Doctor breathed. “Beautiful! Absolutely beautiful! I mean, highly dangerous, of course, given what it’s going to be used for, but still, beautiful.”

 

He pressed the sonic again and the transmitter retained its bell disguise once more.

 

Hannah frowned. “Doctor, is that some kind of chameleon circuit? Like the Tardis has?”

 

“It is indeed,” the Doctor agreed, thoughtfully tapping the sonic against his jaw, his brow furrowing in concentration. “Stolen, I bet.”

 

“From your planet?” Molly asked.

 

The Doctor turned to her with a pained smile. “No, Molly, I’m afraid I haven’t got a planet to steal technology like this from any longer.”

 

“Mm,” Hannah murmured, folding her arms. “And Cybers don’t have time travel like the Daleks, so they couldn’t have stolen it from Gallifrey while it was still...around.”

 

Sensing that this was something of a sensitive subject, John cleared his throat and asked “So...what, the Cybermen send their signals through here and the whole country make their way to a factory to get converted into Cybermen too, then?”

 

The Doctor nodded, bouncing back into his usual self. “Something like that, John.”

 

Sherlock suddenly stiffened. “Someone’s coming.” The others frowned and then heard what he had heard, footsteps, growing louder, and closer. “One human, one Cyberman,” Sherlock muttered.

 

“Cyberleader, most likely,” the Doctor muttered. “Come on.”

 

The five of them rounded the corner where they had left the Tardis and pressed themselves flat against the wall in time to hear a Cyberman bleat out “This must be completed! The conversion of this entire planet cannot wait another day!”

 

“I can assure you, it will soon be finished,” came the smooth tones of the human, and Sherlock frowned, searching through his mind palace for where he had heard that voice before. “Tomorrow, at the latest. I’ll make my men work all night if I have to.”

 

The five friends exchanged a worried look.

 

“See that it is done!” the Cyberleader ordered, before turning to look through the window down at the vast city of London stretched before it. “Our work at the factory has already been delayed far too long!”

 

The man gave a slightly nervous chuckle as he whipped out his mobile phone. “Don’t worry, soon every single human on this planet, besides me and my men, will be converted.” The Cyberleader stomped around to look at him. “You will have perfection.”

 

“See that it is done!” the Leader ordered. “My army will prepare for the conversion!”

 

The Doctor glanced at his human friends and mouthed a “Don’t worry,” at them as the Cyberleader marched towards the staircase. As his footsteps died away, and the other man became engaged in a conversation with someone called Jeff on his mobile, the Doctor turned questioningly to Sherlock.

 

“You know who he is?” he guessed.

 

Sherlock nodded. “And so should you two,” he added, glancing at John and Molly. “Jonathan Woodley.”

 

John’s eyes widened slightly. “The ex-MP?”

 

“That’s right,” Sherlock replied. “Conservative Party MP six years ago, divorced after his wife left him for a Swedish aerobics instructor due to his heavy alcoholism and serial adultery, lived previously in Bannerman Road but now lives in Oxford Street, hates animals and has an allergy to shrimp.”

 

Hannah blinked. “You’ve met him before?”

 

“No, I could just tell all that from his photograph when it was in the paper,” Sherlock replied, looking proud that someone was once again impressed by his detective skills.

 

“Oh.” Hannah shrugged. “Must have missed that.”

 

“Well, Hannah, six years ago, you wouldn’t have been old enough to vote,” the Doctor pointed out.

 

“Would it be possible for you lot to make a little more noise?”

 

The five friends turned to see Woodley looking over at them, his conversation long since finished, staring bemusedly at them.

 

“Probably,” the Doctor replied, cheerfully tucking his hands into his pockets and striding out from behind the corner as if he owned the place.

 

“Well, you should know that I’ve already bleeped for security, and that when I say they’re very good here, I mean very good,” Woodley replied.

 

“And by that, you mean Cybermen,” Sherlock replied, folding his arms. “Yes,” he added as Woodley’s face drained slightly of its colour, “we know you’re working with aliens from, what planet did you say, Doctor?”

 

“Mondas,” the Doctor replied.

 

Woodley frowned, clearly confused that someone else knew about these aliens. “Who are you?” he spluttered.

 

“Sorry, yes, I’m the Doctor,” the Doctor smiled, chipperly, “and this is Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street, Consulting Detective, John Watson, also a Doctor, Molly Hooper, Pathologist and Hannah Waters...Cleaner.”

 

“Ex-Cleaner,” Hannah reminded him, folding her arms.

 

“So, your plan is to transmit a subliminal message across the country and convert everyone into Cybermen?” The Doctor shook his head as he strode up to the transmitter. “You know, that would be a completely _boring_ plan if it wasn’t for this.” He gave the “bell” a flick with his fingers, and it rang a soft sound just like a real bell. “So, where did they get the technology from? Because they wouldn’t have brought it with them from Mondas or Parallel Earth, oh no.”

 

 _“Parallel_ Earth?” John repeated.

 

Before the Doctor could reply, the sound of two Cybermen marching up the stairs approached their ears.

 

“Ah,” the Doctor said, cheerfully. “Yes, I thought something like this would happen. Lucky we came prepared.”

 

He held up the sonic screwdriver and immediately began to fiddle with the transmitter.

 

“Get away from there!” Woodley snapped.

 

“Doctor!” Hannah exclaimed, desperately, as the Cybermen reached their level.

 

“Hostile elements will be Deleted!” they exclaimed, aiming their concealed arm guns at the Doctor’s friends.

 

“Wait!” The Doctor exclaimed, whipping something free from the transmitter and backing away from Woodley. “Now, why don’t you tell them what I’ve got here?”

 

“He’s got the core circuit from the transmitter,” Woodley said as the Cybermen swung around.

 

“Correct!” The Doctor turned to face Molly and winked at her. “Top of the class. _Gold_ star, I’d say! Now, one move to Delete my friends and it goes right out of the window, so back off!”

 

“You expect to defeat us?” one of the Cybermen asked. “We are an army of fifty Cybermen; you would destroy with five humans?”

 

“Oh, no,” the Doctor replied, cheerfully, “I’d destroy you with five humans _and_ a Time Lord! Now, Molly!”

 

Molly levelled her gun and fired, the shards of gold dust spurting from it through the air and catching the nearest Cyberman in the chest. With a horrible gasping sound, like a human having a terrible asthma attack, it fell to its knees as the other Cyberman whipped around and levelled its own weapon at her.

 

“Delete! Delete!”

 

“Delete _this!”_ Sherlock snapped, pressing a button on the grenade he had been concealing in his fist and flinging it at the Cyberman.

 

“Down!” the Doctor shouted as it flew through the air.

 

The controlled explosion was, thankfully, enough to wipe out both Cybermen without destroying anyone, or anything, else in the room. The Doctor scrambled to his feet with a shout of “Back to the Tardis!”

 

“Oh no, you don’t!” shouted Woodley, also on his feet.

 

In the confusion, Sherlock, John and Molly made it back inside, and Hannah ducked around the corner and shouted “Doctor, duck!” before lashing out with the wok. Unfortunately the Doctor didn’t hear her, or react, in time, and she hit him in the face, knocking him off his feet. Woodley looked at her and she held up the wok in what she hoped was a threatening manner. “I have a wok!”

 

Woodley just snatched the wok from her hands and tossed it to one side.

 

“I _had_ a wok,” Hannah observed, ducking down to snatch the core circuit from the Doctor’s hand. Woodley lunged at her, but missed as she managed to leap out of the way in time and snatch up her wok with a mutter of “Oop, that’ll come in useful.”

 

Sherlock suddenly leapt from the Tardis, followed by John, both wielding their pistols in an expert manner.

 

“I can assure you these are loaded,” Sherlock said, calmly, pointing his at Woodley. “Now get over there.”

 

He gestured with the pistol to the transmitter, and Woodley rather grudgingly did what he was told.

 

Hannah and John quickly leapt to the Doctor’s aid.

 

“Doctor, are you alright?” Hannah asked.

 

“Ow!” The Doctor complained, rubbing his head. “Honestly, Hannah, nine hundred years and I’ve never been hit over the head by one of my friends before!”

 

“Well, there’s a first time for everything,” Sherlock quipped.

 

“Sorry, Doctor,” Hannah sighed, pulling him to his feet.

 

The Doctor just flapped at her, and then, seeing the situation, exclaimed “What are we standing around here for? Let’s go!”

 

“You won’t escape,” Woodley sneered. “Every door is guarded by Cybermen.”

 

“Just as well we didn’t come through the door, then, isn’t it?” the Doctor smiled, pulling his friends into the Tardis.

 

“Politicians,” Sherlock muttered, pocketing his gun. “Always cowards in the end.”

 

The Doctor set the Tardis into flight mode and then smiled at Molly. “Well done, Dr Hooper, I was impressed. Now, where’s the core circuit?”

 

As Hannah handed it to him, and asked him why he hadn’t just destroyed it there and then, to which the Doctor pointed out that if he had done that, the Cybermen would have just gone on the rampage and destroyed Britain that way instead whereas this way they could be sure that only they as a group would be targeted by them, plus it would give them time to think of a way to defeat them, Sherlock had to admit privately to himself that he too had been very impressed by Molly’s bravery. But then, he reflected, she was like that, Molly, not quite the little mouse everyone thought she was, and certainly she was one of the few people who had been known to stand up to _him_ before, and that was rather a feat for anyone.

 

“So, where do we go from here?” John asked.

 

“Baker Street,” the Doctor replied.


	6. "Not a Rat, a Cybermat."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!

Mrs Hudson was surprised, at first, by the loud scraping noise that suddenly started up somewhere in the flat above her own, and then reminded herself that she had heard such a noise before, some months ago. By the time she got up to flat 221B, the Tardis was situated quite comfortably in the middle of the living room and the doors were just opening.

 

The Doctor stuck his head out and grinned at her. “Mrs Hudson, hello!” The older woman was surprised when he came up, hugged her and kissed her on both cheeks like a foreign visitor. Then again, she supposed, that was exactly what he was. “How are you?” the Doctor asked. “You look wonderful!”

 

“Mrs Hudson looks the same as she always does,” Sherlock replied in an irritated voice as he exited the Tardis and shucked his coat and scarf.

 

“Well, in that case, Mrs Hudson always looks wonderful!” the Doctor countered, spinning on his heel, his hands theatrically in the air and a great big grin on his face. Sherlock only just managed to restrain himself from grinning back. The Doctor was like that, he reflected, and he often had a hell of a time trying to maintain his air of cool intelligence. After all, he had a reputation to uphold.

 

Mrs Hudson managed a nervous giggle. “Must admit, Doctor, I am a bit surprised to see you back here again.”

 

“Yes, I’m afraid the Earth is in danger from alien invasion again,” the Doctor told her, “but don’t worry, we’ll soon get rid of them.”

 

“How?” John came out of the Tardis and stood next to the Doctor. “You’ve stolen the core circuit, so the chances that we’ll soon have an army of Cybermen coming after us soon is pretty likely-”

 

“Completely certain,” Sherlock corrected him.

 

John rolled his eyes. “We only have the one Glittergun and they have a transmitter that can transmit data across the entire nation. How are we going to stop them, Doctor?”

 

“That’s a very good question, John,” the Doctor replied, “and I wish I had a good answer to go with it.”

 

Hannah, the last to emerge from the Tardis, made her way to the kitchen, tripping over the length of the Doctor’s scarf in the process. “Whoa!” she exclaimed, brought up short. “How did you manage to walk in this thing, Doctor?”

 

“Well, I was taller than you back then,” the Doctor replied, turning to her. “Now where are you going?”

 

“To put the kettle on, because I know you’ll just tell me to do that in a minute anyway, so I thought I’d get ahead of you,” Hannah replied, wrapping the scarf vigorously about her before heading into the kitchen.

 

“So, you don’t have a plan?” John asked the Doctor.

 

“Not yet,” the Doctor replied, going over to the chair usually reserved for clients and seating himself. He drew out the core circuit and tossed it between his hands like a tennis ball. “But I’m sure I’ll think of something soon.”

 

The four humans in the room glanced at one another. Sometimes the knowledge that the fate of the human race was all in the hands of this Time Lord wasn’t hugely comforting.

 

“Right, well,” Mrs Hudson smiled, “does anyone want anything to eat?”

 

“Ah, excellent!” The Doctor’s head snapped up. “I don’t suppose you have any fish fingers in your freezer, do you, Mrs Hudson? Or any custard in your fridge?”

 

Mrs Hudson looked surprised, but decided to humour him. After all, this man had saved the Earth before.

 

“I’ll see what I can find,” she said, drifting after Hannah.

 

“Just tea for us, Mrs Hudson,” Sherlock added, settling himself in his own chair. John and Molly both opted for the sofa.

 

“How did you defeat them last time, Doctor?” Molly asked, tentatively.

 

The Doctor looked over at her and smiled. “Last time was easy; Hannah and I encountered only a handful of Cybermen on Catrigan Nova, which was useful because it had whirlpools of gold there. Last time I fought them on Earth, though, was during the Battle of Canary Wharf, and then there Daleks involved too.”

 

“How did you get rid of them all?” John persisted.

 

“By opening the Void between worlds, which sucked them all inside and saved the Earth from complete destruction.” The Doctor looked sad for a minute. “I lost some good friends that day too.”

 

“Can’t you just do that this time?” John asked.

 

“No,” Sherlock answered, and the others looked at him in surprise. He was sitting with his eyes closed and his hands pressed together in front of him, deep in concentration. “If it was that easy, you’d have done so already?” He opened his eyes and looked over at the Time Lord. “Am I right, Doctor?”

 

The Doctor nodded, gravely. “For one thing, it would be too dangerous, and for another, the Cybermen haven’t crossed the voice to get here this time, they’re lacking in Void stuff, so even if I did open the Void again, there’s no guarantee they’d be dragged in again.” He frowned, thoughtfully. “You know, I’m almost prepared to swear that that transmitter was built on Gallifreyan technology.”

 

Before any of the others could ask what “Gallifreyan” meant, Hannah emerged from the kitchen with a tray of tea. “Your food’s coming, Doctor,” she promised when he gave her a questioning look.

 

The Doctor smiled at her, his grin broadening seeing that she had remembered biscuits, and Jammy Dodgers among them. He bit into one, thoughtfully as the others picked up their mugs and murmured their thanks to Hannah.

 

“Tea girl, coat rack, waitress; I just keep going up in the world,” Hannah muttered to herself, exiting the room with the tray.

 

The Doctor blew on his tea before taking a careful sip.

 

John sighed. “One of the most dangerous alien races in the world is threatening our planet, and we’re just sitting here, drinking tea.”

 

“We’re British,” Sherlock reminded him. “It’s what separates us from the Americans.”

 

The Doctor sat up a little straighter, suddenly. “You know, if we could somehow block their signal-”

 

He was cut off as Molly suddenly stiffened and said “Doctor, um...”

 

She nodded towards the window, and everyone looked around.

 

“Ah!” The Doctor exclaimed, putting down his cup and getting to his feet. “Yes, I thought that might happen!”

 

With a sudden splintering of glass, the window shattered as the small silver weevil-like thing threw itself into the room, and everyone ducked to avoid the flying shards. The Doctor quickly leapt onto his chair and whipped out the sonic screwdriver as the metallic creature with black teardrop eyes and a mouthful of sharp organic white teeth began to scuttle across the floor. Sherlock quickly leapt to his feet, pistol at the ready, as John and Molly took the Doctor’s lead and leapt up on the furniture. There was a great deal of panicked yelling as the thing turned this way and that, clearly searching for a potential target, sniffing out for something, and then leapt towards the Doctor.

 

Before the Doctor could move however, Sherlock had fired his gun. The thing fell to the floor, but quickly turned back onto its feet again. Before it could initiate another attack, a large wok came down over it, trapping it in place with a loud clang and Hannah fell on it with a yelp of “Got it!”

 

The thing jumped around inside the wok, trying to throw her off, and the Doctor quickly sprang from his chair with an exclamation of “Well done, Hannah!” before couching beside her. “Let me in, there’s a good girl.” Hannah lifted the wok ever so slightly and the Doctor aimed the sonic screwdriver inside. There was a metallic whir and then the wok ceased to move. Hannah removed it and the Doctor picked up the metal creature in one hand, straightening up to show it to the others.

 

“It’s alright,” he said, when they looked at him, warily. “It’s perfectly harmless now. I’ve managed to fry its memory.”

 

“What is it?” Molly asked, climbing down from the sofa. “Some kind of rat?”

 

“Not a rat, a Cybermat,” the Doctor rhymed, tossing it to her.

 

“Let me guess,” Sherlock said, drily, “one of the Cyberleaders “pets?”

 

“Scouts, actually,” the Doctor replied, tucking both hands deep inside his pockets. “Probably sent here to retrieve the core circuit.”

 

“It smashed my window!” Mrs Hudson sounded quite indignant about it, and the Doctor was momentarily reminded of his friend Donna.

 

“Yes, that one’s going to be hard to explain to the repairmen,” John agreed, scratching his head. “Or we could just tell them it was kids throwing stones.”

 

“Hey, custard’s boiling over!” Hannah exclaimed, hurrying back into the kitchen.

 

“What were you saying about blocking their signal, Doctor?” Sherlock asked.

 

The Doctor perked up. “Yes! If we could infiltrate this,” he held up the core circuit, “and replace their message of Cyber conversion with something else, something that would block out their signal, modify it to play something more...” he snapped his fingers desperately, searching for the words, “human,” he landed on, finally, “we might have a way of defeating them!”

 

“That would spoil their plans, I suppose,” John agreed, dubiously.

 

“We need to remind the Cybermen what it is to be human,” the Doctor went on. “Don’t forget they were like us once! If we can do that, if we can tap into that teeny, tiny bit of their human-like consciousness that still exists, the part that they’ve almost completely filled up with thoughts of destruction and conversion and hatred, if we can infiltrate that, we can defeat them for good.”

 

“Ah,” Sherlock murmured, already locking everything inside his mind palace for future reference. Then, to John and Molly’s puzzled looks, he added “If you’d become completely inhuman and then suddenly saw yourself for what you truly were, wouldn’t it drive you mad?”

 

“Yes!” the Doctor answered for them. “It’s happened before! Cybermen see themselves through human eyes and destruct!”

 

Molly shuddered. “That’s kind of horrible.”

 

“Best not to think about it too much,” the Doctor replied, patting her arm.

 

“So, what, we get someone to give a speech about what it means to be human into that?” John asked, pointing to the core circuit.

 

The Doctor shook his head. “Couldn’t guarantee everyone would listen. Young people especially don’t have much interest in politics.” He scratched his head, thoughtfully. “How do you get people _to_ listen these days?”

 

Before any of the others could answer, they were struck by a sudden sound coming from the kitchen, all realising a second later it was Hannah singing to herself.

 

“Do you ever feel already buried deep? Six feet under screams but no one seems to hear a thing...” Hannah chanted softly, finally pulling the pan of custard off the stove and pouring it into a bowl, throwing in the six fish fingers she had done to go with it. “Do you know that there’s still a chance for you, ‘cause there’s a spark in you. You’ve just got to ignite the light and let it shine, just own the night like the Fourth of July...”

 

The Doctor snapped his fingers, a great grin spreading across his face, and sprinted into the kitchen, skidding to a halt in front of her. “Hannah! You can sing!”

 

She blinked. “Yes, but you knew that already, Doctor,” she said, speaking slowly and deliberately, and wondering if the Doctor had just been hit over the head or something. Or if perhaps she had actually damaged him more than she had thought in accidently clouting him with the wok.

 

“No, Hannah, I mean you can sing into this! We can use you to save the world!” The Doctor grabbed her and kissed the top of her head again.

 

Hannah jumped. “Please stop doing that, Doctor!”

 

The Doctor took the bowl from her hands and spun to face the others. “It’s brilliant! Hannah sings that song to inspire the nation, the Cybermen explode and it’s back here in time for tea! Brilliant!” He took a bite of a custard-dipped fish finger and then held the bowl out to the others. “Sorry, does anyone else want one?”

 

The others just blinked at him.


	7. Fireworks in the Clock Tower

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!

“We really need all this stuff?” John asked.

 

The Doctor looked up from uncoiling a long tube, which, he had informed them, was actually wiring from San Helios, with an expression on his face that clearly said he couldn’t believe John was asking that question.

 

“Yes, we do, John,” he replied, “because without them, Hannah won’t be able to replace her voice with the real signal and the fate of humanity will end in complete disaster, resulting in every single person and animal being upgraded to Cyber form until there’s nothing actually living on Earth whatsoever.”

 

John blinked. “Sorry I asked.”

 

Sherlock was busily wiring up a connection the way the Doctor had shown him. With both his hands full, he couldn’t answer his mobile, which was now ringing, not that he would have anyway if he had had his hands free, but the sound was annoying him.

 

“Molly, top pocket,” he sighed.

 

Hannah looked up with a frown as John and Molly exchanged a surprised glance, and then Molly hesitantly did what she was told and retrieved his mobile for him. “Its Greg,” she informed him.

 

“Who?” Sherlock muttered.

 

“Who?” the Doctor echoed.

 

“Lestrade,” John supplied for both of them.

 

“Oh.” With a dramatic sigh, Sherlock answered it. “What is it?”

 

“His name’s Greg?” the Doctor repeated.

 

“Well...”John looked confused. “What did you think it was? Inspector?”

 

“No, but he didn’t really strike me as a Greg,” the Doctor replied. “Did he strike you as a Greg, Hannah?”

 

“Nah, a David or a Rupert, maybe,” Hannah replied, thoughtfully.

 

“Or a Lance,” the Doctor added, now finding the end of the wire and fitting it to the core circuit.

 

“Lance? Really?” Hannah asked, frowning.

 

“Well, _I_ think so,” the Doctor replied, glancing over at Sherlock.

 

“Well, if you haven’t seen any in the last hour, isn’t it obvious that there aren’t any left?” Sherlock snapped, irritably, into his mobile.

 

Then, to the surprise of everyone, the Doctor quickly snatched it from him and said “Lestrade? The Doctor here. No, listen, you can leave the Cyber-hunting for now. You lot need to get to the top of Big Ben in the next,” he checked the Tardis computer, “twenty six minutes, or less, and make sure you bring the Dalek guns. Don’t worry, we’ve got a plan. Well, Hannah’s going to sing, that’s all you need to know. Hannah, go and take a Vocal Zone,” he added, looking directly at her. “No, actually, take three.” Hannah made a show of throwing up her hands, which caused John and Molly to laugh, and Sherlock to smile, and left the room. “Now, you’re going to have to force entry if there are Cybermen waiting outside-oh, sort yourselves out. You’re humans! You’re hardly likely to muck _this_ up! Meet us at the top!”

 

With that, he promptly ended the call and thrust the phone back into Sherlock’s hand.

 

“Hold this,” he added, thrusting the other end of the wire into Molly’s hands and promptly running out of the room.

 

The three humans were left, Sherlock on the floor with the core circuit, Molly standing behind him holding the wire and John standing by the control panel, his arms filled with a plastic box full of various bits and bobs that the Doctor had thrust into his arms earlier, blinking and wondering how the hell that had just happened.

 

“He must have coffee,” John said, finally. “No one can talk that fast without it.”

 

“He’s not human,” Sherlock reminded him. “And has two hearts. Besides, he’s not twitching or breathing rapidly like most people when they ingest caffeine.”

 

Molly frowned. “He’s got two hearts?”

 

Sherlock gave her a look and then said, in a bored way, “Oh, yes, you weren’t there when Hannah said that, were you?”

 

“Right,” the Doctor said, coming back into the room with his sonic screwdriver in one hand and an actual screwdriver in the other. He picked up the core circuit and began to fiddle with it. “Just a little bit of technical rewiring, and then plug it into the Tardis systems, and we can wipe its memory, and then replace it with-”

 

“Hannah’s singing,” Sherlock finished.

 

“Correct!” the Doctor replied. “Speaking of which, Hannah,” he added as she came back into the room, “you’d better not say anything until it’s time for you to sing.”

 

“Well, can I-?”

 

“Ah!” the Doctor ordered, holding up a finger to silence her.

 

“But-!”

 

“Ah!”

 

Hannah shot him a glare which the Doctor returned, and folded her arms. Molly stifled a giggle and even Sherlock looked vaguely amused as the Doctor went back to what he was doing, and eventually straightened up with a triumphant. “Aha! Now-!” And he grabbed the other end of the wire from Molly and plugged it into the Tardis console. Hannah opened her mouth to ask him if he was sure he knew what he was doing but the Doctor pressed his finger to her lips and twiddled with some controls using his free hand. After a moment’s concentration, he applied the sonic screwdriver and both the console and the core circuit emitted a low humming noise. The core circuit glowed once and then the light died, along with the noise.

 

“And done!” the Doctor finished with a triumphant grin as he dropped his hand from Hannah’s mouth and pivoted to face his audience. Sensing he was seeking praise, Hannah clapped. John took the initiative and said “Well done, Doctor.”

 

“Yes, it was rather, wasn’t it?” the Doctor agreed, straightening his bow tie. “Now, Hannah, come here.”

 

Hannah did as she was told and Sherlock got to his feet to wander over to the console, Molly right behind him. The Doctor produced a small portable microphone from beneath the console and after some more twiddling with the sonic screwdriver and the wire, he nodded to Hannah.

 

“Alright-” He broke off and frowned at her. “Where are your headphones?”

 

“What head-?”

 

“No, don’t tell me!” the Doctor interrupted, clapping a hand over her mouth. “Typical! Wait there!”

 

He ducked out of the room again and Hannah was about to say something rather indignant when Sherlock reminded her “You’re supposed to be saving your voice.”

 

“Don’t you start!” Hannah warned, looking as thought she might hit him.

 

The Doctor came hurrying back with a set of headphones and plugged them into the system too. Hannah frowned. “Doctor, wouldn’t it just be easier to-?”

 

“No, it wouldn’t!” the Doctor snapped. “And you shouldn’t be talking, Hannah!”

 

“Well I’m about to start singing,” Hannah pointed out.

 

“I think he means in general,” Sherlock quipped.

 

That time, Hannah did hit him.

 

“Come on, no time to waste!” The Doctor spun her around to face the microphone. “Now, sing your heart out, Hannah! Sing for England!”

 

Hannah rolled her eyes but did as she was told. Whilst she was singing, the Doctor fiddled with the microphone, fixing another wire from it to a small black box. The others waited until both he and Hannah were done before any of them spoke.

 

“What are you doing, Doctor?” John asked.

 

“Back-up plan, just in case,” the Doctor replied, as Hannah removed her headphones. “But only in case the core circuit overloads and,” he coughed, “explodes, but there’s only a one in one thousand chance of that happening.”

 

“Explodes?” Molly repeated.

 

“Oh, it’d only be a little explosion, like earlier,” the Doctor replied, casually. “Hannah, hold onto this just in case,” he added, thrusting the microphone and the box back into her hands. “Press that button if anything goes wrong, not that it will. Now, we just plug this,” he added, holding up the core circuit, “back into the transmitter, and-boom!” He made a little gesture with his hands. “No more Cybermen!”

 

So saying, he quickly set the Tardis into flight mode.

 

“Sounds simple enough,” John commented.

 

“What could possibly go wrong?” Sherlock muttered, sarcastically.

 

With her usual scraping and grinding of gears, the Tardis landed in the same spot as before.

 

“Ah!” The Doctor exclaimed, upon bringing up the scanner, which he had fixed right before setting up anything else at Hannah’s insistence. “Yeeeah, we’re about to find out, Sherlock!”

 

The others came up behind him.

 

“Oh, no!” Hannah groaned.

 

The Tardis was surrounded by Cybermen, and they were all pointing their weapons at the doors.

 

“Well, the good news is that we can exit the Tardis without being killed,” the Doctor said, cheerfully. “The shields protect us as long as we’re close to it.”

 

“But the bad news is we can’t put that in the transmitter,” John pointed out.

 

“Uh...no,” the Doctor agreed.

 

“And yet you’ve clearly got a plan because you’re not looking worried,” Sherlock commented.

 

“No, I did think that something like this might happen,” the Doctor agreed. “Let’s go!”

 

The others stared after him as he shot out of the door, and then, hearing gratings of “Delete! Delete!” and blasts from the Cybermen, they all followed in a panic.

 

The Doctor grinned at them. “See?” he said, showing them that he was perfectly unharmed. The Cybermen fired a few more shots, all of which were absorbed by the shields protecting the Tardis.

 

“Is that it?” the Doctor asked them, mockingly. “Now, I know what you lot are after; this!” He held up the core circuit for the transmitter. “You want this. And we have it!”

 

“Yes, I think they’ve worked that out already, Doctor,” Sherlock muttered.

 

“It’s called “stalling,” Sherlock,” Hannah hissed.

 

There was a sound of blasting from downstairs and the Doctor grinned. “Ah! Right on cue!” He grinned at Sherlock. “Good to be friends with the boys, and girls, in blue, isn’t it?”

 

The Cybermen didn’t seem perturbed by the activity downstairs at all.

 

“You have reached a stalemate, Doctor!” the Cyber Leader grated.

 

“They remember you, then,” Hannah muttered.

 

“Yes, I’m afraid I have,” the Doctor announced, cheerfully. “I need to leave the tribophysical waveform macro-kinetic extrapolator to plug this into the transmitter, but if I do that, you lot will just delete me anyway. Tricky, isn’t it, Hannah? A bit like Dungeons and Dragons – did you ever play that game?” He grinned at her. “I love Dungeons and Dragons! Except for one thing; I never liked that logic puzzle, you know, with the doors. I always got that one – wrong!”

 

Cottoning on, Hannah pressed the button on the microphone. “Well, sing!” the Doctor shouted as an ear-splitting amount of static feedback resonated throughout the room, the signal penetrating the inhibitor signal devices implanted in the Cybermen’s helmets, and they all let out terrible groaning noises as they clutched their heads. Taking advantage of their sudden brainstorm, the Doctor quickly ducked out from the Tardis shields and ran to the transmitter.

 

Jolted into action, Hannah began to sing.

 

“Do you ever feel like a plastic bag,

“Drifting through the wind, wanting to start again?

“Do you ever feel, feel so paper thin,

“Like a house of cards, one blow from caving in?”

 

“Louder, Hannah!” the Doctor shouted, plugging the core circuit in. “What kept you?” he added as Lestrade suddenly appeared at the top of the stairs, with Sally and Anderson right behind him.

 

“Too many Cybermen!” Lestrade shouted back. “And these have stopped working!”

 

He indicated the Dalek gun he was holding.

 

“What? Oh, no! I thought I’d charged them!” the Doctor yelled back.

 

One Cyberman staggered in their direction and the Doctor quickly activated the transmitter. The song burst from it like a wave and everyone else clapped their hands over their ears as the Cybermen staggered around, wrestling between their command circuits and what was left of their humanity.

 

“Come on,” Sherlock muttered to John, ducking back into the Tardis. “I thought I saw a mirror back here.”

 

“What do we do?” Molly asked Hannah, who had stopped singing into the microphone in favour of saving her ears.

 

“Wait!” Hannah called back over the sound of her own voice, echoing.

 

“What’s happening?” Lestrade shouted to the Doctor as they both ducked to the ground with their ears covered.

 

“We’re putting the Cybermen back in touch with their human sides!” the Doctor shouted back.

 

“All of them?” Lestrade shouted. “Because there are lots downstairs!”

 

“Did you see a man called Woodley down there at all?”

 

“No! No humans! Just Cybermen!”

 

Abruptly there was a pop and a burst of sparks, and the song died. The Doctor’s eyes widened and he sprang to his feet. “No! It overloaded!”

 

“Can you fix it?”Lestrade asked, seeing that the Cybermen seemed to be recovering.

 

Before the Doctor could answer, Hannah shot forwards to where the transmitter was and began to sing live again.

 

“’Cause, baby, you’re a firework!

“Come on, show ‘em what you’re worth!

“Make ‘em go, oh, oh, oh,

“As you shoot across the sky-y-y!

“Baby, you’re a firework!

“Come on, let your colours burst!

“Make ‘em go, oh, oh, oh,

“You’re gonna leave ‘em all in awe, awe, awe!”

 

“Well done, Hannah!” the Doctor cried, hurriedly feeding one of the wires from the core circuit back into the microphone. “Keep it up! Oh, well done!” he cried again as Sherlock and John came running out of the Tardis with a large mirror. The Cyberman they held it up in front of spotted itself and faltered, moaning. “I’m sorry!” the Doctor shouted. “Really, I am!”

 

With that, the Cyberman’s head exploded and it fell to the floor. A Cyberman nearby turned shakily towards Sherlock and John, but before it could fire, Molly sprang out with the Glittergun, which she still had tucked into her coat pocket, and let it have it in the chest. The Cyberman stumbled backwards and crashed into the window of the clock face. It staggered and then fell, down to its death.

 

“I hope that didn’t hit someone!” Lestrade shouted.

 

The Doctor finished his wiring and applied the sonic again. Hannah just kept singing.

 

“You’ve just gotta ignite the light

“And let it shine

“Just own the night

“Like the Fourth of July

“’Cause, baby, you’re a firework..!”

 

“I...am...” One of the Cybermen staggered about to look at the Doctor. “I...was...Woodley...MP for...for...”

 

“I’m sorry!” the Doctor called again.

 

“As you shoot across the sky-y-y!

“Baby, you’re a firework!

“Come on, let your colours burst..!”

 

Her voice was resonating across the entirety of the UK. Below, in the streets, people were stopping whatever it was they were doing, and looking around for the source of the song.

 

“Hey, something just exploded!” John exclaimed, pointing out of the broken clock face.

 

“Aha! That’ll be the conversion factory!” the Doctor cheered. “Looks like your singing overloaded it, Hannah! Excellent!”

 

There was only one Cyberman left on their level now that hadn’t exploded yet, and that was the Cyber Leader. Of course, the Doctor figured, that one would put up the most resistance. It staggered about and levelled its blaster at Hannah.

 

“Delete! Delete!”

 

Hannah threw herself to the ground in the nick of time, and the shot hit the transmitter. There was a large crash as it wrenched itself apart from where it was hanging, taking its true form instead of the Great Bell disguise, and began to roll towards them.

 

“Hannah, move!” the Doctor shouted.

 

“What?” Hannah cried back, yanking her headphones off and then just throwing herself out of the way in time. Unfortunately, she was still holding onto the microphone, the wire of which was still attached to the transmitter, and as it crashed into the Cyber Leader, it dragged her with it. The whole thing bounded towards Sherlock, Molly, John and Lestrade and knocked them all through the glass.

 

“No!” the Doctor yelped as Hannah was dragged with the transmitter out of the clock face. He ran to the glass with Sally and Anderson in his wake, in time to hear Sherlock say “There is a way out of this; just let me find it!”

 

“Need a hand?” the Doctor called down to them, as they were all dangling off the clock hands, looking up at him. “Hand! Get it?”

 

“Very funny!” Lestrade shot back up. “Now get us back up, Doctor!”

 


	8. Time Will Tell...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sequel to A Study in Tardis Blue sees the Doctor, Hannah, Sherlock, John, Molly and Lestrade take on yet another species of alien in London, whilst at the same time solving an intriguing puzzle!

“Right, get you get back, get you back up,” the Doctor muttered, ducking back inside the clock tower.

 

“Hurry up, Doctor,” Hannah muttered. Sometimes he could really push her faith in him to the limits.

 

“Any ideas?” John asked.

 

“Well, if we had a rope, we could just climb up,” Sherlock replied through gritted teeth.

 

“How about a scarf?” The others glanced at her, even Molly, as Hannah whipped the scarf from her neck and began to struggle with the knot around her waist. She had tied the Doctor’s scarf around her body after the last time she had tripped over it, tucking it under her clothing, which gave her the appearance she had put on weight in the last hour or so. “With extra strong Gallifreyan wool?”

 

Sherlock’s face broke into a grin. “Well done, Hannah.”

 

“Careful,” John advised as Hannah finally undid the knot one handed, just as her fingers slipped off the clock hand.

 

“Hannah!” everyone shouted as one and Sherlock seized the end of the scarf. Unravelling like an aerial dancer in a roll of silk, Hannah seized the other end in the nick of time and found herself dangling a few feet under her friends.

 

“It’s always funny when that happens in films,” she muttered, grimly, clinging to the scarf for dear life. Thankfully Sherlock, with a bit of input from the others, was able to hoist her back up again.

 

“What happened?” The Doctor appeared back at the hole in the glass.

 

“Just grab the end of this,” Sherlock snapped, shove it to John. “Pass it on.”

 

“Pass it on,” John said to Lestrade, and the Doctor quickly reached for it. Sally took it into her head to grab hold of him just in case he fell out of Big Ben too. With a yelp of “Geronimo!” the Doctor held up the end he had just seized in triumph.

 

“Are you ok?” Molly asked Hannah.

 

Hannah shook her head. “No. I mean, can you imagine if Sherlock hadn’t grabbed me? I could have hurt somebody!”

 

Lestrade chuckled as he managed to hoist himself up the face of the clock.

 

“Come on, John, you next!” the Doctor called as they all shuffled over towards the scarf, well, all except Molly, who was still clinging grimly to the hour hand.

 

“Come on, Molls,” Hannah said to her as Sherlock seized the end of the scarf.

 

Sherlock glanced at her as she still looked doubtful about moving, and then snapped “Oh, for God’s sake, Molly Hooper! You’re a top pathologist who deals with dead bodies and idiots, and you’ve just helped save the world from a group of trigger-happy alien-robots; if anyone can deal with their fears long enough to rescue themselves from danger, it’s you! Now do what Hannah says!”

 

Molly blinked at him.

 

“Alright,” Sherlock muttered with a sigh, and then to Hannah’s surprise, he ignored the scarf and swung himself past her, muttering “Excuse me, Hannah,” and stopped just in front of Molly. Hannah quickly took the opportunity to grab the end of the scarf and climb up to where the Doctor was waiting to give her a relieved hug.

 

“Molly, look at me,” Sherlock commanded, and when she did, he looked straight into her big brown eyes. “You are not going to fall. Alright? Do you trust me?”

 

He held out a hand to her. Molly nodded, slowly.

 

“And do you trust the Doctor?”

 

“Yes.” It came out as a whisper.

 

“Come on, then,” Sherlock insisted, thrusting his hand at her. “Hold on tight.”

 

Molly nervously took his hand and then gasped as he pulled her against him. She quickly clung to him as Sherlock held her tightly. The Doctor quickly took the chance to take everyone by surprise again as he tied one end of the scarf around his waist and then leapt onto the minute hand. Sherlock glanced up at him and then muttered to Molly “Up you go.”

 

The Doctor reached down and caught hold of Molly’s hands, pulling her up onto the minute hand. “That’s it,” he said, gently and encouragingly, almost like a real Doctor as he led her over to the hole in the glass, where John was waiting to help her through. “Nearly there.”

 

Molly gave a little whimper and clung to John as he pulled her inside. “Alright,” he murmured, patting her. “You’re alright.”

 

Hannah quickly went up and hugged her.

 

“Come on, then, Sherlock!” the Doctor called, yanking him up onto the minute hand. Coolly dignified as ever, Sherlock simply turned up his collar, straightened his scarf and ducked back inside Big Ben. The Doctor grinned and followed him. “Right,” he muttered, “now-”

 

“We’ve still got the matter of some alien gadget in the heart of Westminster, Doctor,” Lestrade pointed out.

 

“Yes!” The Doctor snapped his fingers and pointed both hands at him. “The transmitter! But I’d like to know where it came from!”

 

“Can’t we just leave that to UNIT?” Hannah asked. The Doctor gave her a look and she sighed. “Why did I even ask?”

 

The Doctor rolled the scarf back up and tossed it into her arms. “Come on,” he said, “quickly!”

 

He made for the stairs and the others hurried after him. Sally and Anderson blinked before running after him.

 

“Hey, why is there a Police Box up here?” Anderson called as they ran.

 

“It’s not a Police Box, it’s a highly advanced spaceship that travels in time, Anderson, do keep up,” Sherlock sighed.

 

Molly giggled.

 

They skidded to a halt just inches away from the crashed transmitter, which was surrounded by muttering locals who were staring at it in awe and confusion.

 

“Excuse me!” the Doctor called, whipping out his psychic paper and holding it up like a police badge. “Torchwood here! Excuse us! Please don’t panic! Everything’s under control! Lestrade, can you..?”

 

He gestured, and Lestrade understood.

 

“Alright, people,” he called, ushering them off with the help of Sally and Anderson. “Move it along, there’s nothing to see here!”

 

The Doctor approached the transmitter, which was emitting a slow, feeble beeping sound.

 

“Sounds like it’s crashed,” he muttered.

 

“We just saw it crash,” Hannah said, and then realised. “Oh, you mean like a computer?”

 

“Yes,” the Doctor agreed, whipping out his sonic screwdriver, and, to the bewilderment of everyone else, a pair of 3D viewing glasses. “Ah!”

 

“What?” Hannah asked. “Voidstuff?”

 

“Voidstuff,” the Doctor agreed, passing her the glasses. “Take a look.”

 

“I know what Voidstuff looks like, Doctor,” Hannah reminded him, peering through the glasses, and then glancing at Sherlock. “Want a look?”

 

She passed them to him. With a frown, Sherlock put them on and noticed what they had been able to see, colourful waves of dust clinging like a residue to the air around the transmitter. He passed the glasses to John, who then passed them onto Molly. The Doctor, meanwhile, was busily scanning the transmitter with the sonic screwdriver. His eyes suddenly widened and he yelped “Get back!” ushering them all back to a safe point. A second later, the transmitter self-destructed, exploding right in front of their eyes. Everyone leapt down with their arms over their heads and as the acrid smell of burning filled the air, the Doctor glowered at the remains of the transmitter.

 

“No!” he growled, running towards it and scanning it. He shook his head. “No, there’s nothing now! Why did it have to do that?”

 

The others blinked at him.

 

“Probably a failsafe,” Hannah ventured. “To stop someone else from using it.”

 

The Doctor sighed, tucked the screwdriver back into his coat pocket and ran a hand through his hair. “Think,” he muttered, “think, think...” He shook his head and then perked up. “Oh, well! I guess we’ll find out where it came from in the future. Or the past. Come on, Hannah, back to the Tardis.” He pivoted around and pointed to Sherlock and the others. “Do you lot want a lift home?”

 

“I’d rather go back to Bart's and explain why I’m late from lunch,” Molly said.

 

“But, Molly,” the Doctor grinned. “It’s a time machine. We can take you back to right before you’re due back from lunch!”

 

She gave a relieved smile. “I was forgetting.”

 

“Actually, a life home would be nice,” John added, and Sherlock nodded.

 

“Think I’d better stay here,” Lestrade said. “Keep an eye on this.”

 

He gestured to the mess that had once been a transmitter.

 

“Excellent,” the Doctor replied. “I’ll get UNIT to come and sort it for you.” He held out a hand to Lestrade. “Well, until next time.”

 

Lestrade grinned and shook his hand. “Thanks, Doctor. For everything.”

 

“Actually, can we have a word?” Hannah asked, grabbing his arm and leading him a little away from the group.

 

John looked surprised. “What do you think that’s all about?”

 

“Isn’t it obvious?” Sherlock replied. “She’s asking Lestrade to let Anderson down gently for her, if he asks, although I don’t know why she’s asking him, I could do that.”

 

“No, Sherlock, you couldn’t,” John sighed.

 

Lestrade smiled at Hannah’s request. “Consider it done.”

 

“Thanks,” Hannah smiled, before reaching up to give him a hug.

 

“Come on, then,” the Doctor called to her and she ran to join the group as they made their way back up to the top of Big Ben. Lestrade waved after them and then sloped casually back to his colleagues.

 

“Who exactly _is_ he?” Sally asked.

 

Lestrade frowned at her. “Well...he’s the Doctor.”

 

The first thing the Doctor did when they reached the Tardis was to open up the panel in the door that concealed the telephone and call UNIT.

 

“Hello, is that Kate? The Doctor here. Yes, it’s about a little incident in Westminster-oh, you’ve heard. You’re on your way? Good, now listen. When you get there, look for a man called Inspector Lestrade, tall, grey-ish hair, professional manner, very nice, and he’ll fill you in on the details. There’s also the matter of a dead boy at a factory, he’ll fill you in. You know about that already? Excellent. No, sorry, Hannah and I have places to be. Glad you understand. Bye for now.”

 

He hung up and beckoned everyone else inside the Tardis. “Right, you first, Molly,” he grinned, “and might I just say that you were very brave throughout this whole incident. I knew we could count on your assistance.”

 

Molly smiled. “Well, for someone who’s not overly fond of violence, I actually enjoyed that.”

 

Hannah grinned at her. “Adrenaline rush, isn’t it? Fighting aliens?”

 

She held up her hand for a high-five which Molly returned.

 

The Doctor smiled and set the Tardis to fly, not missing the fact that Sherlock was giving Molly an admiring look when she talked about enjoying fighting the Cyberman.

 

“There aren’t any more Cybermats around, are there?” John asked.

 

“No, they’d have all gone the same way as the Cybermen when they heard Hannah singing-that was some quick thinking too, Hannah, when the core circuit overloaded,” the Doctor added, grinning at her.

 

“It’s what comes from hanging around with you,” Hannah replied. “Sometimes you’ve just got to improvise.”

 

The Tardis landed and the Doctor opened the doors. “Well, there you go, Molly.”

 

“Thanks, Doctor,” Molly replied. “Oh, here,” she added, reaching into her coat pocket and holding up the Glittergun.

 

“Um, why don’t you hold onto that for now?” the Doctor replied. “You never know, it might come in useful. BUT, don’t let anyone else know you’ve got it, understood?”

 

“Understood,” Molly replied, and then shyly she gave him a hug. The Doctor smiled and returned it. Hannah ran up to hug her too. “Bye,” Molly said, slightly regretfully, as she stepped out of the Tardis.

 

“See you soon,” John said, cheerfully, to perk her up a bit and she smiled as the doors closed and the Tardis took off. Fingering the Glittergun in her pocket, Molly made her way back to the morgue, feeling that the next body on her slab would probably be a twenty three year old, history student with no family save for an older brother living in New York, who was allergic to cats and had had more girlfriends in his lifetime than John and the Doctor combined.

 

The Doctor, meanwhile, was on a bit of a high as he set the controls for 221B Baker Street.

 

“Nice girl, Molly,” he commented.

 

Sherlock said nothing.

 

“Yes, she is,” John agreed, with genuine warmth.

 

“Here we go, then,” the Doctor announced as the Tardis landed. The doors opened and the four of them stepped out...to find Mycroft Holmes sitting on the sofa, waiting for them.

 

“Who let you in?” Sherlock scowled.

 

“Who do you think?” Mycroft asked, getting to his feet. “Doctor, we meet again. It’s alright, Miss Waters, you can relax,” he added, as Hannah had stiffened the second she had seen him, “I’m not here to dissect your best friend. I’ve specifically had orders _not_ to do that.”

 

“Really? Well, that’s good! From whom?” the Doctor asked, brightly, tucking his hands into his pockets.

 

“An old friend,” Mycroft smiled, tightly.

 

“Ah! _That_ old friend!” the Doctor grinned, turning to Hannah. “See, I always say it’s good knowing Royals!”

 

Hannah laughed in relief.

 

“She referred me to all your files in UNIT,” Mycroft sighed, “and as such, you are free to go about your business as usual, whatever that may be.”

 

“And you came all the way over here to tell him in person?” Sherlock scowled, sarcastically. “Spill whatever you came for and then get out, and don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

 

“I wouldn’t give it the satisfaction,” Mycroft snipe back, turning to the Doctor. “Though I must admit I did have an ulterior motive.”

 

“Go on,” the Doctor replied, cheerfully.

 

Mycroft cocked his head on one side, studying the madman in front of him. “You traverse the universe, making friends and enemies, and saving planets from death and destruction. You’ve save this planet from being invaded and taken over so many times that the people in UNIT are running out of space for your files.” The Doctor smiled. “But nowhere in any of the files can I find the answer I’m looking for.”

 

“And that would be?” the Doctor asked, raising his eyebrows.

 

“The reason why,” Mycroft replied. “Why do you do this, Doctor? Why do you save Earth?”

 

Sherlock made a “Pft!” sound and threw himself down onto the sofa.

 

“Because, Mycroft,” the Doctor replied, “every once in a while, this planet just needs a Doctor.” Mycroft looked slightly humbled by that answer. “And now, Hannah,” the Doctor added, “shall we go?”

 

“I’ve got a brilliant idea where to go next!” Hannah exclaimed.

 

“Where?”

 

“Regency Britain!”

 

“George the Third? Excellent choice!” The Doctor clapped his hands together. “I might see if I can get one of those snazzy hats!”

 

“Anything’s better than that fez,” John grinned.

 

The Doctor gave him a look. “Fezzes are cool,” he insisted, doing the trilby trick with it, and earning amused applause from his fellows. “And on that note, in the words of Andrea Bocelli, it’s time to say goodbye.”

 

Hannah ran up to John to give him and hug and then ran up to Sherlock, who was still on the sofa.

 

“Don’t you even think about it,” he said. Hannah sighed and then ruffled his hair like a dog. “Hannah!” Sherlock exclaimed, indignantly.

 

The Doctor laughed and patted John’s shoulder. “Keep safe,” he said, “and if anything strange happens-”

 

“We’ll know you’ll be there somewhere, Doctor,” John replied, smiling.

 

The Doctor beckoned Hannah and then saluted to Mycroft before calling “Sherlock?” Sherlock looked over at him, and the Doctor grinned. “That was a very kind thing you did for Molly on the clock face. Bye!”

 

Mycroft looked over at Sherlock as the Tardis began to dematerialize. “You did a kind thing, Sherlock?”

 

“Don’t get used to it,” Sherlock muttered, closing his eyes.

 

In the Tardis, Hannah was getting excited about their next trip. “We could meet Thomas Blood, Doctor! You know, the man who nearly stole the Crown Jewels-”

 

“And got let off for it,” the Doctor finished with a smile, although Hannah got the feeling that there was more on his mind than the prospect of another adventure.

 

“Are you alright, Doctor?” she asked.

 

“Hannah,” the Doctor replied, with a serious expression, “we saved the universe today, but we still don’t know where that technology the Cybermen were using came from, nor have we found out yet why we keep crossing paths with Sherlock.”

 

Hannah frowned at him. “Are you worried?”

 

“Not yet,” the Doctor replied. “I don’t think there’s anything to worry about, really. But you never know.” He flicked a switch on the console. “Time will tell.” Then, he grinned at her as he took hold of the lever to land the Tardis. “It always does.”


End file.
